A North Carolina Board of Elections official mentioned Tuesday that the state has already adopted “most of the solutions that nationwide political figures at the moment are suggesting after the very fact” to make sure the presidential election just isn’t derailed by the widespread injury attributable to Hurricane Helene.
On Monday, the North Carolina State Board of Elections handed a decision that expanded the authority of election officers in 13 counties “severely disrupted” by the catastrophe. Impacted voters can drop off absentee ballots exterior of their residence county, and election officers have extra flexibility to arrange and employees polling locations in close by counties.
Of the ten measures proposed by the Trump marketing campaign, greater than half have already been addressed by the State Board of Elections, Patrick Gannon, a spokesperson for the North Carolina State Board of Election, instructed ABC Information on Wednesday.
In a bipartisan method, the state has already authorized measures to make sure voters affected by Hurricane Helene “would be capable of solid their ballots with confidence,” Gannon mentioned in an announcement to ABC Information.
An aerial view of flood injury alongside the French Broad River within the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, Oct. 2, 2024, in Asheville, N.C.
Mario Tama/Getty Photographs
“Skilled election officers within the Tar Heel State, in contemplating the suitable measures to take, took into consideration the flexibility of those measures to ease the burdens on disaster-affected voters, the flexibility of native election officers to hold out these measures with out vital disruption, and the significance of sustaining time-tested procedures that shield the integrity of the election,” Gannon mentioned.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger mentioned this week that his state, additionally devasted by Helene, is engaged on plans to make sure that each poll solid for the Nov. 5 election shall be counted.
Raffensperger mentioned whereas Helene precipitated widespread injury and energy outages in his state, he doesn’t anticipate there to be any main disruptions to the overall election. He mentioned election places of work and voting gear within the state’s 159 counties escaped severe injury.
Early voting is predicted to begin in North Carolina on Oct. 17 as deliberate. Early voting in Georgia is predicted to start on Oct. 15.
As of Monday, each county election workplace in North Carolina was opened, in comparison with final week when 14 of these places of work had been closed as a result of storm.
Karen Brinson Bell, govt director of the North Carolina Board of Elections, instructed reporters this week that the state plans to deploy groups to help with absentee voting at catastrophe shelters earlier than early voting.
Bell mentioned authorities might usher in Nationwide Guard tents or FEMA trailers to behave as polling areas, and he or she insisted that it may be performed securely and safely.
“It is not as spacious as your regular polling location, but it surely does present the area essential on the present voting website if the car parking zone [of a polling site is] nonetheless accessible,” she mentioned. “[And] even in a short lived construction we will nonetheless preserve safety of the voting gear and security of our employees.”
One of many hardest-hit counties in North Carolina was Buncombe County, which sustained historic flooding. The county contains Asheville, the eleventh-largest metropolis within the state.
Corinne Duncan, the director of Buncombe County Election Providers, mentioned that some polling locations must be modified due to lack of water or energy. She mentioned the storm spared a lot of the election places of work and voting gear.
“I am right here to reassure our neighborhood that Buncombe County will vote,” Duncan mentioned at a information convention Monday.
