by Jordan Jones, Editor, Blue Review

Last Wednesday, my wife Leslie and I used our VRA (Verified Registration Agent) credentials to help register voters in the Democratic Party booth at the New Mexico State Fair. The fair is over, but, for me, the good feeling remains. 

We registered several voters and chatted with many more. There was a great deal of enthusiasm because of the Kamala Harris / Tim Walz campaign, but also specifically due to Kamala Harris’s performance in her first, and likely only, debate with Donald Trump the night before. The consensus of people who came by the booth (and the majority of all voters, see the link in this week’s “5 Things”) was that Harris had cleaned Trump’s clock, wiped the floor with him; you pick your trope, we probably heard it at the Fair.

In addition to helping people register to vote, we were also handing out campaign buttons, signs, and t-shirts. Reasons people came up to the booth varied. One family of five or six, in town from Indiana, wanted a Harris / Walz car magnet to stick to their truck to let their neighbors know that “not everyone in Indiana agrees with them.” Alas, we did not have such a car magnet to give them.

When Leslie asked one man who approached her in the booth whether he was registered, he said no. It turned out that this 60-year-old had never voted. He explained that he had a couple of DUIs 25 years ago, and was convinced that he was not eligible to vote. This is exactly the kind of fear the Republican party has been trying to stoke with all of their challenges of the vote. They are not trying to stop illegal voting — all the research has shown that there is no significant problem with illegal voting — they are trying to suppress legal voting, by convincing people that they are not eligible to vote.

I pointed to the part of the registration form that says a voter cannot be “currently incarcerated for a felony.” This man is definitely eligible to vote. I walked him through the completion of the New Mexico voter registration form. He was so happy! His girlfriend has been voting, and now he can as well. He’s looking forward not only to voting in general, but to voting for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, and Democrats up and down the ballot. 

This simple act of helping someone exercise his civic rights and duties as a voter was moving for me. There is enthusiasm out there. That doesn’t mean the election is decided. We need to harness this enthusiasm in ourselves, and in the broader electorate, to get out the vote, and elect Democrats up and down the ballot. We’ve been given an opportunity in the clear contrast between the regressive, so-called populist (but actually billionaire-ist) Trump / Vance ticket, and the forward-looking, inclusive Harris / Walz ticket. 

Do what you can to help Democrats win! Opportunities abound in the announcements below.