Election Day has thus far brought out more than 800,000 New Yorkers to polling sites to cast their ballots in the critical presidential race between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, along with important down-ballot races.
The polls are open until 9 p.m. tonight. After 1 million votes were cast during early voting in the Big Apple, the city’s Board of Elections anticipates long lines at polling sites Tuesday. If you are on line at your polling site at closing time, do not leave — you will get a chance to vote.
As of 3 p.m. Nov. 5, the city’s Board of Elections reported 817,628 Election Day voter check-ins citywide. There were 1,089,328 check-ins logged during the nine-day early voting period between Oct. 26 and Nov. 3.
New York has 26 electoral votes up for grabs. Harris is favored to win the Empire State, as no Republican has carried New York since Ronald Reagan in 1984.
New Yorkers will also vote in similarly impactful local elections for Senate, House, State Senate, State Assembly and Supreme Court and Civil Court judges. Voters will also answer six state and local ballot questions.
Issues in Queens
Turnout has been steady and strong thus far around the five boroughs, though there are sporadic reports of voting issues at some locations — including in Queens, where some ballot scanners were reportedly malfunctioning.
Margaret Cuffe reported that four scanning devices at her polling place, P.S. 88 in Ridgewood, malfunctioned when she went to vote just after 9 a.m. Tuesday morning; problems with the machines were said to have been happening since polls opened. For some voters, it took up to 20 minutes for the two-page, double-sided ballots to be scanned — if at all.
“It took me 10 attempts on one ballot, the other went through in five minutes,” Cuffe said. “I felt pretty lucky compared to some of the other people. Everyone is having issues with those machines.”
According to Cuffe, a few voters were so frustrated with the failed scanning efforts that they handed their ballots back to workers and walked out.
The Board of Elections, in a statement, said it dispatched technicians to all 290 sites in Queens to investigate and resolve any malfunctions. They assured all New Yorkers that “any ballot cast will be counted,” and claimed that “voters have not been impacted beyond additional attempts to scan their ballot, or have it placed in the emergency bin as is protocol.”
Motivations to vote
At the Fashion Institute of Technology polling site in Manhattan, voters reported issues logging in with the BOE’s iPad devices to verify their identities. As a result, some voters were forced to fill out an affidavit ballot.
Not surprisingly, the presidential race between Harris and Trump was foremost on the minds of voters like Remy Toledo of Manhattan, who spoke about his concerns that Trump, if re-elected, would rule as a dictator and not as a traditional American president.
“I feel like our nation, democracy is under threat,” said Toledo, a native of Colombia but now an American citizen. “I think having a dictator in power is not what America is about.”
Other voters at the FIT site, like Brian Gordon, expressed appreciation for the power to vote and express his stances at the ballot box.
“My stance is that I respect the entire process. We’re very lucky to have the opportunity to vote as opposed to some other places around the world,” Gordon said.
A man who identified himself as Chris told amNewYork Metro that he cast his vote for Harris, whose history has a prosecutor swayed him.
“I voted presidentially for Kamala Harris. She is very well knowledgeable, a very balanced person, and as a prosecutor, you can never be too far on one side of the other — you are looking for the truth,” Chris said.
Despite polls suggesting a tight race between Harris and Trump, Chris says he is confident his candidate will come out on top.
Turnout was also solid at Riverside Church in Harlem. Among the voters there was Yuval Wiesel, 26, a first-time voter with family in Israel. She said foreign policy and the war in the Middle East were foremost on her mind, and what motivated her to vote for Trump.
“I’m also half-Israeli. I’m from Israel, and the situation now in my country is very complicated. And for me, there is hope that if Trump wins, there’s something that is gonna change. And that’s the reason I feel like I’m voting,” Wiesel said. “He’s good for the Middle East. I think he knows what he’s doing. I think he cares about what’s going on there.”
Wiesel says she is also concerned about rising prices and immigration.
Courtney Cogburn, 45, meanwhile, brought her young son with her to see her vote in what she feels could be a historic election and has the state of democracy at stake. She is voting for Harris.
“She’s rational, intelligent. She has lots of experience, I think a level headedness that’s really important for this office in particular, as compared to Trump. For me, who doesn’t feel competent or in the right mind, as far as I’m concerned,” Cogburn told amNewYork Metro. She is also excited about the possibility of electing the first female president but stressed she is not voting for her because she is a woman but based on who she is.
“I think it’s a beautiful thing that we have a woman, that we have a black woman, a South Asian woman, who’s in the position to lead our country, I think what’s most important is that she’s competent and capable,” she added. “And I wouldn’t put someone in that position because they were a woman, simply because they were a woman.”
At Bronx Borough Hall, turnout was said to be much higher than normal. About 500 ballots were cast there Tuesday morning, a much higher turnout than usual, poll workers say. At around noon, the line at the polling site was growing to where someone said to hold the line outside.
One voter, a 74-year-old woman who has lived in the Bronx for 40 years, said that she voted for Harris, saying there was a need for change and that she didn’t like Trump.
“We need a change in government,” she said. “I don’t trust him [Trump] one bit,” and he needs to “stop being so nasty, first of all.”
She also didn’t believe that Trump was the right choice for women. She noted that while he claimed that he would protect women, “I don’t buy that.”
Protecting your rights to vote
Gov. Kathy Hochul and state Attorney General Letitia James spearheaded efforts this year to combat misinformation that intentionally or unintentionally disrupts the voting process. They also reminded New Yorkers of their rights when casting their ballots in person.
Under state and federal law, it is illegal for anyone to intimidate, threaten or coerce voters in an attempt to disrupt their right to vote, the attorney general’s office said.
Registered voters in all five boroughs can find their designated polling station on the city’s Board of Elections website at vote.nyc.
According to the city’s Board of Elections, a bipartisan team of poll workers can help voters who need assistance. Interpreters will be available when required for Spanish, Chinese-Mandarin, Chinese-Cantonese, Korean, and Bengali, the board explains on its website, vote.nyc.
Throughout Tuesday, amNewYork Metro will be at polling sites across the city, gathering comments from voters and gauging turnout. Check back later for updates, and unofficial election results as they come in after 9 p.m. tonight.
