Washington Post: ‘I’ve been crying for days’: How voting became the latest of 2020’s many anxieties

10.16.2020 / By Karen Heller
Washington Post: ‘I’ve been crying for days’: How voting became the latest of 2020’s many anxieties

“I would be very happy if it wasn’t not coming down to Pennsylvania, if we were just one of the many states one way or another,” says Suzanne Almeida, a lawyer for the state’s chapter of the watchdog group Common Cause.

PHILADELPHIA — A few weeks before Election Day, a line of three dozen voters in Eagles and Flyers masks spools in front of Roxborough High to drop off their ballots. It is a gift of a cloudless autumnal day yet the anxiety is palpable.

“I’ve been frightened. I’ve been crying for a few days,” says Bernadette Neal, 68, a Black, retired special-education teacher, completing her ballot on a nearby bench. Visibly flustered, Neal drops her handbag, then her ballot.

President Trump’s debate comments about his supporters watching the city’s polls and his refusal to condemn far-right extremism left her shaken. “I’m so afraid they’re going to send in white supremacists, Proud Boys.”

Voting should be easy. It should be safe. For many Americans, it appears to be neither. …

Pennsylvania is a petri dish of voter unease. In this presidential contest, the state has been crowned the tippiest of tipping points, its 20 electoral votes considered a necessary way station to arrive at 270. Both Trump, who won here four years ago, and Joe Biden — a son of Scranton, a constant in his political rhetoric — desperately want to win the state. Trump staged a rally in Johnstown on Tuesday; Biden held his televised town hall in Philadelphia on Thursday. …

“I would be very happy if it wasn’t not coming down to Pennsylvania, if we were just one of the many states one way or another,” says Suzanne Almeida, a lawyer for the state’s chapter of the watchdog group Common Cause.

 

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