Ballots & Boardrooms: A Voter’s Guide to Local Leadership

Monèt and Quay get into the critical aspects of election oversight with Erica Porter, chair of the Wake County Board of Elections. Learn about legislative control over election regulations, acceptable forms of identification for voting, and the impact of college IDs on voter participation. Erica shares insights into building electoral trust and encourages voters to actively participate in observing the electoral process to dispel myths surrounding voter fraud. Plus, hear about the implications of the North Carolina Supreme Court's decision to remove RFK's name from the ballot, and the logistical headaches it causes for counties that had already begun printing ballots.

Are you ready to start the conversation? Eat, chat and act with Down Ballot Brunch.

Down Ballot Banter is hosted by Monèt Marshall and Quay Weston and is a production of Earfluence.

Creators & Guests

Host

Monet Marshall

Director. Playwright. Arts Consultant. Cultural Organizer.

What is Down Ballot Banter?

Welcome to Down Ballot Banter, the podcast that puts the spotlight on local elections and what local government actually means for you. Hosted by Monèt Marshall and Quay Weston.

00:00:04 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Hey, y'all. Welcome to down ballot banter. The podcast puts a spotlight on local elections and what local government actually means for you. I'm Monet Noel Marshall.

00:00:13 - Quay Weston
And I am Quay Weston.

00:00:14 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Yeah, you are.

00:00:16 - Quay Weston
Local elections are extremely important, and we're on a mission to learn together and to break down local politics in a way that makes sense to us and doesn't require us to be experts, because we are not. Hello.

00:00:27 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
So, whether you're a seasoned voter or this is your first opportunity, we've got the insights and information to keep you informed and engaged.

00:00:34 - Quay Weston
Because when it comes to building new worlds, all of our inputs matter.

00:00:39 - Erica Porter
Yes.

00:00:40 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
So, if you're ready to learn with us, let's go.

00:00:49 - Erica Porter
Hey, y'all.

00:00:49 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Welcome back to Downville Advanter. I am Monae Noelle Marshall.

00:00:54 - Quay Weston
And I am Quay Weston.

00:00:56 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Yeah, you are.

00:00:57 - Erica Porter
Yes, you are. Wow.

00:00:58 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
We hear you, and we are here with a friend, someone I deeply respect and have a million questions for, as y'all will see in a little bit, the Erica Porter. How are you today?

00:01:09 - Erica Porter
Oh, my gosh. Thank you for having me. I'm doing great. Getting to do talks like this just makes me excited, so I'm even better than normal.

00:01:17 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Well, good. Cause we're also excited.

00:01:18 - Quay Weston
Yes. Okay, we got questions.

00:01:20 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
We got questions.

00:01:21 - Quay Weston
There may be some.

00:01:22 - Erica Porter
Listen, I'm gonna try to answer as many of them as I can.

00:01:24 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
I trust. I trust. But before we jump in, we just want to know, like, who are you as a human? Erica.

00:01:31 - Erica Porter
Wow.

00:01:32 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
I know. Easy question.

00:01:34 - Erica Porter
Well, you know, I'm the daughter of Rosa Porter, the daughter of Jerome Porter, come from Louisiana, came to North Carolina and did my elementary school, came to Raleigh, went to college at NC State, stuck around. And that's where I really got into politics. I was looking for a group of people who thought like me after I graduated, trying to just get involved, and I was like, well, let me go check out the young democrats one day. And that's where I ended up going to a meeting. And Monet knows me, and so if I do something, I'm gonna go all the way. And so it started off as a meeting. I ended up becoming the president of the Young Dems in 2010. Right?

00:02:21 - Quay Weston
Just going to a meeting.

00:02:24 - Erica Porter
Yeah. No, I let them keep their jobs, you know, and then I came in later, but it was really around the Obama term, and this was before he was really running. It was like, you know, obama, Hillary, and all them, and they were going around the country, and, you know, and it was right after, I think, Oprah did the one thing with Obama right? And so, like, I was like, well, let me get involved with people who believe like me, think like me, and see where I can make a difference. And so, like I said, I became president of the young Demsite, and I always helped with fundraising. Cause that's in my background, event planning. And so I'm the kind that just sticks around, you know, like, how can I help? How can I help? And so I stuck around the party for a while, and then my opportunity came in. Actually, it came in 2016 when I was asked to be a part of the board because someone was stepping off, and so I had to get the party to nominate me. And so there's a whole process to become a board member. I had to go speak in front of the party, and it was me. And this is a funny story. It was me, and, like, all these old white men, right? So I'm standing up there in front of the party and they're, you know, we have to talk about, why should you vote for me? Cause technically, we have to get the party to vote in our way, and then they send our name to the governor and to the state party. Okay, so it's a little mini election, right? So, you know, we had to give our speech, and I was like, you know, I don't look like any of these guys. So first of all, first things, first things first. I was like, you know, I don't look like these people, right? And I was like, I bring a different vibe. I bring a different lens to the conversation. And apparently my friends were in the background. Cause, you know, I have a lot of people that I know, and people don't realize that. And people were like, oh, just cause she's black doesn't mean she needs to be on the board. You know? So they were talking smack. Of course they were, right. But I got it. And so I joined the board. But if you pay attention to politics, that's when they were trying to change the makeup of the board. So back in 2016, going into 2017, the board was at a hold. So, like, we had gotten appointed, but we weren't technically on the board until 2017. So I got sworn in in 2017, and there's been three new makeups of the board since. So, like, this has been a big ordeal. Cause back in the day, board of elections was nothing, right? Like, we did the election, we went home. Nobody knew who we were. You know, we were behind the scenes. And right around then is when elections started getting more popular into the process of the election. And so we've seen three different makeups of the board since I've been on there since 2017. But Governor Cooper appointed me as chair for Wake county in 2019, and so I've been in that seat ever since.

00:05:08 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
That's awesome. And how long is your term?

00:05:10 - Erica Porter
Two years.

00:05:11 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay.

00:05:11 - Erica Porter
So this is my second seat, my second term as chair.

00:05:15 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay. Okay.

00:05:16 - Quay Weston
Are there limits on how long you can be on the board of elections for your county?

00:05:20 - Erica Porter
No, I'm the youngest person on the board, only person of color. And by youngest, I mean by about ten to 15 years, at least. And so there are people, whenever we go to our state conference, and I see people all around the county have been on the board for, you know, 1520 years. Wow. So, yeah, you can keep going as long as you have interest.

00:05:40 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay. So one of our questions was about the process. So I think what I'm hearing you say is that each party gets to nominate folks to be on the board. So total. On the wake county board of elections, how many people are there total? And what is the. Is it an equal number of, like, democrats to republicans to independent? Like, how does that look?

00:06:00 - Erica Porter
So right now, the way it stands. And I say right now, because there's a bill out there trying to change makeup again, so. Right. Again. So right now, as it stands, whatever party has the governorships. So the Democratic Party has the governor. They have majority.

00:06:18 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay.

00:06:18 - Erica Porter
But outside of me. So I'm the chair. Right. And then there's two members from the Democratic Party and two members from the Republican Party. They're nominated by their parties and are sent to their state party chair, and that's who puts them on the board.

00:06:33 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay.

00:06:34 - Erica Porter
For the chair. That's an appointment position from the governor.

00:06:37 - Quay Weston
Got it.

00:06:38 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay.

00:06:38 - Erica Porter
So each chair of each county has been appointed by the governor, but the other members have been appointed by their respective parties.

00:06:45 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Oh, okay.

00:06:46 - Quay Weston
I have, like, a very foundational question. I was talking to a friend about this yesterday. I have always known people to choose a party. Democrat, Republican in most cases. But what I didn't understand is, like, how one becomes a member of those parties. I thought people just, like, were members in name. Right. But it sounds like there's actually a member body who votes for you in that case.

00:07:13 - Erica Porter
Right.

00:07:14 - Quay Weston
So, like. Yeah. How should people think about joining a party if they so choose formally? Yeah.

00:07:20 - Erica Porter
So you are a member of the party once you choose that on your vote of registration. Right.

00:07:26 - Quay Weston
That makes me.

00:07:26 - Erica Porter
So you are a part of the party, but if you want to be more of an active member of the party. And that's kind of how I came about was, you know, there are meetings, like, the party meets every month, and it drills down to your precinct. So you can get involved at your precinct level, and you can even have a leadership role in that. So there's precinct officers, and that really is how you've seen people go to the conventions. That's really how you get involved. And you've got to start at your precinct level. So having a leadership position there and then moving up on the county level, regional, state level. So there are levels to this. Right. I'm a Democrat.

00:08:06 - Quay Weston
Correct.

00:08:06 - Erica Porter
I'm a Republican. Right. I'm an independent on my registration. But to get really involved, it means going to the meetings, being involved in your precinct, organizing, and getting folks out.

00:08:20 - Quay Weston
Thank you.

00:08:21 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay, so you shared about your path. Can you tell us what the board of elections does?

00:08:26 - Erica Porter
Yeah.

00:08:29 - Quay Weston
What are you responsible for? Cause there's only five of y'all, so that doesn't seem.

00:08:33 - Erica Porter
There's only five. But I. We are the ones who administer the election. Like, the short term of that is we administer an election. So that goes from, you know, we choose polling places, we choose early voting locations. We hire staff. My statutory duty is to hire our director. Her name's Olivia McCall, in Wake county, and then she hires the staff. So I will say there are five of us in Wake county, and we are so lucky. Even in Durham county, they're lucky. We have a county commissioner who, county commissioner group, who believes in what we do, who understands the importance of elections. So we don't have to do as much of the grunt daily work as some of the smaller counties. And that grunt daily work right now is absentee ballots. Those are. We're supposed to go out a week and a half. So that's a huge job right now. The amount of people sending in requests is a lot higher during a presidential election. So, you know, they're doing that. They're making sure that registrations are being processed. There's so many voter registration drives happening everywhere, and people are turning in those forms, and then the staff have to make sure everything's in that they're checked, that the person who is registered isn't registered in another county, or they're moving it over. So there's a lot of research and whatnot that goes into that. Preparing for our board meetings, legal cases. You know, we have a huge legal case right now in Wake county. So there's a lot that happens behind the scenes. And most people only think you just go and vote and somebody counts it up. Counts it up, and that's it. But we, our staff is working 24/7 especially right now, a lot of overtime. But we work every day throughout the year. Cause we do an election at least once a year, sometimes two to three times a year.

00:10:27 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
And it is a paid position.

00:10:28 - Erica Porter
So I have a stipend. I get a stipend.

00:10:30 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay.

00:10:30 - Erica Porter
So it's a volunteer position with a stipend.

00:10:34 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay.

00:10:35 - Erica Porter
But if you count up the stipend with the hours that we work, it's a volunteer position.

00:10:44 - Quay Weston
Yeah. I'm curious about some of the things that you've learned so far. Right. And I'm especially curious around what you're learning in your perspective on, like, what's surprising to you about how we think of the electoral process. Like, citizens and people who vote, as you just mentioned. Like, you think you just choose a party and you go and you vote, and they run it through the machine, and then it's counted and you look online and it tells you how many people voted. That's my relationship to it in most cases. Some cases. So I'm curious about, like, your learnings and what things have been surprising to you.

00:11:24 - Erica Porter
Oh, gosh. There's a few of them, I would say, just talking about the election in general. Right. You go vote. Like you said, you go home and you see everything on the tv. The things that happen to get everything on the tv has been really interesting, and I've actually really enjoyed being a part of it. But like all of our governance, all of my power comes from the legislature, and people usually don't understand that. And that's not something I understood in the beginning. The board of elections power comes from the legislature. And so we are just following the law. Like, we don't get to make up rules. We don't like. Everything I have, I should have brought it in, but I have a book about this thick that's laws of North Carolina elections and rules, and that's everything we do. It could be found in that book, and you can look at it online, too. It's up there. But one is that the legislature rules everything. Really, if you want changes in election, it's gonna come from the legislatures, it's not gonna come from us. Yeah. We have a larger mouthpiece, and maybe we might be able to influence. And when I say influence, I mean influence in procedure, not party, not who's gonna come out and win, not who is, who's being elected, not who's running for office. But in the procedure and policies that make the election go, we might have a bigger mouthpiece than everyday North Carolinians but that was a huge surprise for me. And then just the actual counting of the votes is very interesting. And I encourage everybody to go check out a meeting. It might be boring, but you'll learn something because we look at everything, and when I say everything, I mean everything. Like absentees coming up, our first absentee meeting in 2020 presidential election. Yes, it was Covid. So I'll go ahead and start there. And more people were voting by mail, but we looked at over 36,000 ballots.

00:13:21 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Just in Wake county.

00:13:22 - Erica Porter
Just in Wake county at our first meeting and totaling over 175,000 mail in ballots over the five week period that we looked at them. So when I say we look at it, we look at it. We're sitting there looking and making sure that everything's right on these ballots to make sure that they count. And then people worry about voting provisionally. You know, say you go to the wrong polling place, you can still vote. And what happens is we'll count the contests that you're eligible for for where you live, so you can vote provisionally. And we look at all those, too. So there's a lot of work that goes into seeing those numbers that you see on the screen at the end of election night. And it's been really fun.

00:14:01 - Quay Weston
Wow.

00:14:02 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Thanks for sharing that, Erica.

00:14:04 - Quay Weston
Yes.

00:14:04 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
You know, I think it does hearten me to know that there are, like, actual humans looking at those things. I think in my brain, I just felt like it's a machine that's just, like, spitting it through. So it does feel good that there's humans on the other end and that you're one of those humans. I have a question about. There's a lot of fears and misinformation and disinformation about voter id laws and, like, what that means for North Carolina in this election. So I was wondering if you could, like, help us understand what do we need to take to the polling place in order to vote.

00:14:36 - Erica Porter
Right. So this is the second time we've had voter id. The first time happened, I believe it was 2016, but then they stopped it, and then this is now what's happening. Right. The first time we administered election was the 2023 municipal, and that was the first time we used it. In Wake county, we vote over 800,000 voters. And so we tend to see things that happen, you know, the good, the bad, before every other county. And we kind of inform the state on what needs to happen. Voter id still brand new, even though we've technically had two elections. Right. We've had the municipal, we've had a primary. There are a lot of people who still don't know that they need to bring their id. So the huge thing that I'm going out is telling all of this, right? So you need to have an id and it needs to be an acceptable id. And there's a list of those. You can go to ncsbe.org, i mean, dot gov, sorry, the government website for the state of. And it'll have a list. So part of that list is your usual driver's license or your non driver id that you can get at the DMV. Those are accepted. All these need to be unexpired or if they've expired, it has to be within a year. So a year of the day you go to vote. Right. If it expires after that, then it's not legible. I mean, nothing. Sorry. It's not eligible if you're 65 or older. There's another caveat. So these are all the things we're having a look at while we're looking at these ids, right? So if you're 65 or older, your id can be expired as long as it expired by your 65th birthday on or after your 65th. So we're looking at that. Right. You can have a college id, but your college had to fill out a form and get approved by the state to use that id because there has to be certain things on it, right. There needs to be an expiration date, a picture. Obviously, there needs to be your name on it and whatnot. So those are the things we're looking for, your college id. There's a whole list, and they just approved more for this election. So there's a printout list. You can get a PDF if you want to share it out with folks. I recommend that, especially with the colleges around here, we have quite a few universities and then also tribal ids. So if you're part of a nation, you can use that id, federal ids and ids that you get for being part of government services. Okay. That's a lot.

00:17:09 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
That's a lot.

00:17:09 - Erica Porter
That's really helpful.

00:17:11 - Quay Weston
Yeah, we were talking about the expiration piece and like, your id expired in my bank. I want to call you out.

00:17:17 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
It's all right, it's all right. I'm going to take care of it. It's just the DMV lines have been so long.

00:17:22 - Erica Porter
Well, here's another thing. And I was doing this for the primary and it was great then telling everybody, go to the DMV website, get that free id that you can get if you don't have a driver's license and they'll get it to you, but right now they're about six weeks behind and mailing. And so we're about out of time. Are people going to do that? The other idea I did not mention is you can go to your county board of elections and get a voter id for free. So they'll print it out for you and it's usable for elections. It'll have your picture on it, it'll have your name, and then it'll have your voter number. So it's not identifiable. Identifiable information unless you really search all that information is public information, but it's not all going to be written on there.

00:18:03 - Quay Weston
Okay.

00:18:03 - Erica Porter
So you can go and get that as well.

00:18:05 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay.

00:18:06 - Quay Weston
Get that if you would like.

00:18:08 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
And we're going to drop links in the description so that people can go and get this information 100%.

00:18:13 - Quay Weston
So you mentioned colleges and we were just talking briefly about ongoing, ongoing slash, maybe just concluded situation with UNC and students. What was it that they have digital college ids, essentially. And there's this ongoing question or ruling around whether that's an acceptable form of voter id because it's digital. And I know there's some language, I didn't copy it here. There's language around it having to be like physical, tangible that you can touch and hold in inspect. So we're curious about instances like that, right, in where these rules change and there's questions, challenges around voter id. And I think it can create confusion. Right. Which then, as we were just talking about, impacts participation in some ways. Right. If you go to the polling place and they say, oh, we actually can't take that. You need to do x, y, z in order to be eligible. What's your perception of things like that? Like instances like that in which the ways voter id impacts students, whomever might play out. Because one of my fears in that specific case is that people don't have access to this information or aren't looking online to see what types of ids are acceptable. And I remember my college days, I would just be like, hey, this is my id that I have and it's digital. Yeah.

00:19:39 - Erica Porter
Yeah. Yay.

00:19:40 - Quay Weston
But then I go to vote and it's not eligible. So any thoughts or comments on that that you have or.

00:19:48 - Erica Porter
Yeah, that is a loaded question in my nonpartisan answer is going to be. So, yeah, everything needs to be tangible, needs to be able to present and somebody look at. So the digital id is tough and we're in a digital age. And like I said, everything's by the legislature. Right. So these are folks who put this law into action and now having to figure it out. Right. So we're having to implement a law that's been pretty new. Yes. They put in some details that we follow, but the digital card, that's new. Fairly new. So that's something that, for the next election, they're really going to have to look at, I believe, because a lot of schools are going that way. But as far as having something tangible, that's what we have to follow right now. And another thing I forgot to tell you is if you do get your id renewed with the DMV and they give you that piece of paper, you know, the fold up piece of paper. That's the temporary. You can't vote with that. That's not a legal document. You have to have the card.

00:20:53 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Okay.

00:20:53 - Quay Weston
Have to have the card.

00:20:55 - Erica Porter
Monet, if yours is expired. When did it just expire?

00:20:58 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
On my birthday, August 29.

00:21:00 - Erica Porter
You can still vote with that card.

00:21:01 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Thank you.

00:21:02 - Erica Porter
Yes.

00:21:03 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
I'm really glad to hear that.

00:21:04 - Quay Weston
That's good news.

00:21:04 - Erica Porter
Yeah.

00:21:04 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
But I am gonna get my card renewed because it's illegal to drive with the facts.

00:21:08 - Erica Porter
I'm not telling her to drive, y'all. I just told her she can go to vote.

00:21:11 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
I'm proud.

00:21:11 - Erica Porter
Somebody will drive her to the poll, and she will go and vote with that card.

00:21:14 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Yes.

00:21:15 - Erica Porter
Okay. Your question a lot. Yes. Not everybody's as involved as I am, or even you all are. Right. Paying attention. So it's really on, like, our parties, it's really on our nonpartisan organizations to really get out there and hit the ground and get this word out, because it's gonna be challenging for folks. It's gonna. Somebody's gonna go and vote. They're gonna be like, oh, I can't show my digital, and then they're gonna turn around, and that's not what we want. And so there are options. You have. If you don't have an id, it's called an exception form. You can fill out at the poll. You will vote provisionally. So there's two ways to do it right. You can vote provisionally, then come back to the board of elections before we canvass, and that means before we fully count and certify the election, which happens the week after the election. So you can come by that, I believe, by that Wednesday to show your id, or you can vote provisionally at the poll and sign the exception form. And it has a whole list of reasons why you couldn't have your id. It's not even a reason saying I don't have an id. It's a reason why I could not present my id at the poll and it could be I left it at home. I don't have my id. Sign that form. Put, you have to put your name and like, your last four digits of your social, I believe, just so we can verify that you're a voter and you can still vote. And your number, your vote will count. We will count it when we canvass the next week. But there's another option if you don't have it and people don't know that as well.

00:22:51 - Quay Weston
Yep.

00:22:52 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
So I'm gonna talk about electoral trust and the ways that people are feeling really challenged across the political spectrum with like, does my vote matter? Am I counted? I vote within the electoral college or voter fraud. I would love to hear your perspective on that and what you would say to a voter who is distrustful of the process.

00:23:22 - Erica Porter
The first thing I would say is, come watch the process. If you don't trust it, come see it. Only you can change your trust or your distrust. And by seeing it, usually that kind of helps the process. Seeing what we're doing and how we're looking at it. You should see the, I don't want to say the arguments, the disagreements we have, the conversations we have about sometimes just one single ballot and making sure it counts. There are people all around the state. And yes, we're all with different parties, but we're there for a reason because we care about elections. So one, we're human. So first I'm going to say that, too. We are human. Humans make mistakes, but we don't go out there intentionally to make a mistake. And the one thing about making a mistake is owning it and right and coming back and making it better. So I will say go to a, go to a meeting and watch. Two, look at the stats. If you look at voter fraud stats, especially in North Carolina, it's barely there. You know, even in Wake county, out of 800 some thousand votes, you know, there might have been one, and I don't even remember that one happening. Right. So it's rare. And people will, the louder folks will say, is happening, happening, happening. But look at the stats. They're there. You can go comb the numbers and find out how many votes were thrown out and it's going to be a small amount. So that's one thing. Two is not just the stats, but do your research on your candidates. Right. I can't tell you who to vote for, but look at who you're voting for. Can you trust that person. Do your research that way. But the biggest thing for me is just to come watch the process. It is open. Everything is public. All knowledge is public. All meeting minutes are public. You can go and read what's happening in your county. We put ours on our website. We have an airtable where you can just click and download all the, the meeting minutes and do your research. And usually once you do that, you'll find that the loud folks aren't really saying the right things. And that seems loud. Right?

00:25:40 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Why is that always the case? Loud and wrong.

00:25:42 - Erica Porter
Loud and wrong, yeah. And that things are actually happening, especially in North Carolina. Like, I can't talk about other states, but in North Carolina we're doing it correctly, safe. You know, we don't have any machines that are hooked up to Internet at all. Everything is air gap. So people are worried about interference. None of our machines can be interfered with. So I'll tell you that, for one, that's another thing that people are worried about. And North Carolina will always be a paper ballot state for as long as, as long as I can think of. I mean, I don't see the, the voters of North Carolina changing to electronic voting. And so we will always have a record to go back to and check the vote as well.

00:26:29 - Quay Weston
That's good. I want to ask about the rigmarole with the ballot printing stuff.

00:26:34 - Erica Porter
Yeah. Let's go. It's been a fun week.

00:26:38 - Quay Weston
Yeah, fun might not be the right word. So as far as we understand, Mister RFK, who fought very intentionally to get on the ballots around the country, was on the ballot. In North Carolina. Things changed. He decided to drop out of the race and support another candidate. And likely his voters will support that other candidate. But in that North Carolina, the North Carolina Supreme Court decided on the other side of that, that we should actually remove his name from the ballot so that at least one of the quotes were that people aren't confused about the option to vote for him because he's no longer in the race. So what that then did counties had already printed ballots, which cost money. And as it seems the resources for counties varies, varies, particularly North Carolina. There's a lot of rural counties and like very small counties and, you know, you get the point. So we're curious about, like, what does that actually like? What's the actual impact of the delay? Right. I've seen and read articles about how North Carolina may miss federal deadlines to send out the ballots to give people enough time to vote. Yeah. But I wonder, like, what are the impacts of this delay? Be it costs or time people have to spend in this reprinting process that we haven't heard about. I'm particularly curious about, like, the federal deadline piece because they didn't say, like, what that means if we miss it. But, yeah. What you got?

00:28:14 - Erica Porter
So I'll start with the federal deadline. That's our Uacava deadline. And that, that is the deadline we have for overseas and military voters to be able to access their ballots and they can do this online. So that deadline is the 21st, which is actually Saturday. You know, we're working towards Friday being a business day, but that day is actually Saturday. And so we will be ready for that date. And that's the date that North Carolina will have the ballots ready for online. I mean, for overseas and military voters. The mail out will go out on that Monday. I believe it was the 24th. And so 23rd. 23rd. What's going out on Tuesday then? Okay, so the 24th is the date, but it's on a Tuesday.

00:28:59 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Got it.

00:29:00 - Erica Porter
That's when the club goes up. No, but. So that's when they'll get mailed out. It's on Tuesday. What has that caused? Yes, is for smaller counties, maybe not as much because they may not have even started the printing.

00:29:15 - Quay Weston
Yeah.

00:29:16 - Erica Porter
So for larger counties like Wake county, when RFK pulled out, we had already been printing because, like I said, we have over 800,000 voters that we have to be prepared for. We had 20,000 ballots that were supposed to go out and that we now have to trash. And as far, and I only talk in White county because I only know white county numbers. But just to give you an idea, to print those 20,000, that was about 20, I mean, 200 some thousand dollars. Okay. Because it's an envelope.

00:29:52 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Mm hmm.

00:29:53 - Erica Porter
And then two other envelopes. Inside it is instructions.

00:29:58 - Quay Weston
Yep.

00:29:58 - Erica Porter
It's your ballot. And that's what goes out to the voter. So all of that, we can't use it because it's been sealed. We can't even go back and reuse the instructions.

00:30:11 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
We can't even know you could use it, but you're like, no, we can't.

00:30:14 - Erica Porter
Because it's been sealed. So we can't reopen any of that. So we had to reprint that. That was over $200,000. And that's not including the staff labor for putting these packets together. And then the overtime that they had to put in from recoding the ballots to take him off. So we have to recode them. We have to prove them. We have to get them approved by the state. We have to prove them again and get them approved for the last time before we can even send them to the printer to print. So our staff worked overtime, and that's not including their staff time. And then we were getting about 800 to 1000 requests a day in Wake county. And so by the time they go out, you know, on that Tuesday, we're gonna have over 30,000 to send out staff time. We had to bring in. We're bringing in, I think it was like 96 folks to help us put all these packets together so that they can go out for Tuesday. So that's more staff time. And this is staff who was working on early voting. Right. So, like, this is staff who was getting ready to go and set up early voting locations because that's going to start on October 17. And we set them up about a week before and go around because in Wake county we have 22 sites. So these are, staff are pulling from other places and then also bringing in our precinct officials to help us get it out. And so, yeah, there's a hefty cost. It was 20% more to print than it was in the beginning because of the rush for Wake county, and a lot of us are using the same vendor. So, you know, people can, you know, do the math for them and their counties, but it's. It's been about a 20% increase in just the reprinting.

00:32:01 - Quay Weston
Wow.

00:32:02 - Erica Porter
And then we had to reorder the supplies for the 20,000 just so we have those back.

00:32:08 - Quay Weston
Yeah.

00:32:08 - Erica Porter
And, you know, so it's just been a waterfall effect. It's been. It's been a lot of work, but like I said, you know, if the law tells us to do it, that's what we're gonna do. But, yeah, and then we had another candidate in wake county who called and emailed and said that they're pulled. They've pulled out. No, and we had to have an emergency meeting on Thursday, and we had to deny that request to remove their name because we were already working.

00:32:34 - Quay Weston
Right.

00:32:35 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
I can't do this again.

00:32:36 - Quay Weston
Yeah. Like, who got time for that? We ain't got time. We got time.

00:32:39 - Erica Porter
Yeah.

00:32:40 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Just waking up in the middle of the night, like, I don't want to run no more.

00:32:43 - Quay Weston
What, are there concerns with that?

00:32:45 - Erica Porter
Like, wasting my time?

00:32:47 - Quay Weston
Yeah. People can probably, like, think about all the reasons it might have happened, but I think, like, what are the concerns? I hear them in the response, like, the time, the resources, the people, the. But, yeah. Are there, like, long term things you're thinking about? Like, I don't know if this happens again or next time or so the.

00:33:07 - Erica Porter
Candidate who we denied, a reason we denied that is because we were testing. So we get all the ballots in Wake county. We have 181 or 82 ballot styles. And so because you can be eligible, depending on where you live, for different people to vote. So there's 180 plus different styles. Different ballot.

00:33:28 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Different styles of ballot, different styles.

00:33:29 - Erica Porter
And so we have to test every piece of our equipment to make sure it's reading them. So we have testing that's going on. And we had already started testing on the last ballot. So now we're retesting the machines for these to make sure the count is going to equal to what we wanted on election day. So that's one, two, if this person does get elected in Wake county and it's a school board race, what happens is their position is vacant and then it goes to the board of elections to fill it. So there's a lot of repercussions.

00:34:05 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
So now y'all just appoint somebody.

00:34:08 - Erica Porter
Yeah, but hopefully somebody else. We're hoping somebody else wins. Right. But I'm just telling you the law, like, if you pull out, and one, we hadn't, at the time we had our meeting, we hadn't received their formal. They have to fill out a form and sign it and send it in. We hadn't received that at the time. So if they go through all of that and then somehow the voters never hear that they dropped out and they get elected, it is considered a vacant position. And then for the school board, it's under our jurisdiction to fill some other positions, either county commission, it's different. But for that one, we would actually have to fill that one.

00:34:46 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
One of the things that people brought up and their concerns throughout this whole RFK situation was the way that partisan politics were playing a part in that. And so it's also making me think about the board of elections person in Henderson county sending this email to three republican senators pretty much saying, like, y'all need to intervene legislatively or legally, because if not the Democrats gonna win. If they win the state, they're gonna win the nation is pretty much what this letter said. Can you talk a little bit about, like, the board of elections supposed to be a nonpartisan body, no matter who's on it. Can you talk about some of the dangers of, like, partisan politics in that space?

00:35:29 - Erica Porter
Yeah. It is nonpartisan. And the caveat is we are brought on partisan.

00:35:35 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Right.

00:35:35 - Erica Porter
Right. So, you know, some people may have trouble distinguishing, but we are, once we are in that role, we are partisan. I am a Democrat. If you look at my registration, but, like, when I'm in that room, I'm nonpartisan. And part of our role as a board of elections member is to not put out our policies, our politics in a public space. I'm not supposed to talk about who I want to win, and that was a clear letter speaking about who you would like to win. And that's something we're not supposed to be doing as board of elections members. We are supposed to look at this with a clear mind and follow the law. And so if you're finding that you're unable to do that, then maybe you need to step down or, you know, there are ways that you can step down, and we can put somebody else in who actually can do this if you find it to be a problem. A lot of members were removed after 2020 because they were posting on their facebooks and their social media about partisan politics. And that's just something that they tell us to just don't do. Me. I have a loudmouth. So my fix is I stay out of it. Right. I try not to pay attention because I don't want to get caught saying something that I'm not supposed to. I pay attention enough. Right. I know what's happening with the laws, but as far as, like, specific candidates and what they're saying, I try to, like, stay to the back and so I don't make that mistake. But, yeah, we have to really keep a clear head and. And, um, just look at everybody as a voter and not a voter of a specific party, and. And that'll help. That helps us do our job a lot better, especially when you're looking at 30,000. Right.

00:37:17 - Quay Weston
Yeah.

00:37:17 - Erica Porter
You know, just making sure you're just looking at the voter. Did the voter do x, y, and z? Yeah. Okay. Then we're good. You know, not, did the voter vote republican? Did they vote democratic or, you know.

00:37:25 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Yeah.

00:37:27 - Quay Weston
Well, I got so many more questions, but we're not going to be here all day, though we probably could. So I'm also curious about your thoughts on how people can leverage their power as voters, like, even beyond elections. Yeah, I know it's been the focus of our conversation, but I'm curious on your I thoughts and perspectives on that piece of things.

00:37:55 - Erica Porter
Well, you know, I have an organizing mindset, organizing background. So whatever party you're with or whatever your issue is that you want to focus on, get around like minded people, but don't just get around like minded people.

00:38:12 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Right.

00:38:13 - Erica Porter
Okay. That's where people can get into cloud or, you know, a bubble and nothing. Hear other opinions, which I think is important. And so make sure you're spreading out because, one, we're in Durham, we're in Raleigh, and we're in a very highly populated area with a lot of colleges and universities. And if you look at maps, especially when you start looking at electoral maps and everything, you'll see like the pockets. Right. You go in a Greensboro area, you got the colleges there, Charlotte.

00:38:46 - Quay Weston
Yep.

00:38:46 - Erica Porter
But once you step out, it becomes very rural. And there are, there are issues that people in rural areas face that we don't face in these more populated cities. And so hearing their opinion is going to be a huge, huge deal on your organizing. And this could literally be any subject, right? Like we could talk art. Art's different here than art in the rural areas. Right. Like any subject, you want to make sure you're hearing other opinions. And people forget that, especially when it comes to elections, is listening to other people and not being so tunnel vision. So my big thing is getting out there and listening to folks, talking to folks, hearing other opinions, and then form your opinion. And if you're wrong, you're wrong. Right? Like, it's okay to be wrong. We're humans. We mess up all the time. But what you do want to mess up is going to be the big thing. If you're going to stand ten toes down being wrong, then that's a problem. And that's going to cause issues and it's going to trickle down. Right. So the biggest thing is to have that organizing mindset find your issue, find the people who can make policy on it. Right. Meet those folks, too. Find out what it takes to make the policy right. Okay. Because just making a policy is one thing, but the steps that it takes to get a policy written, voted on the enact it all, that is a lot. And people think that it's just really simple. Like somebody said, we need to do this now, it's a law, and it takes a lot of committee meetings, a lot of the legislature. You can go and sit there and listen and you can call your representatives, you can call folks and let them know how you feel. And you can be a part of that. Hopefully, we've elected people who will listen to their constituents. Right. But making your voice heard at the ballot box is one way, but after that is just to keep up with it. And don't just vote on presidential elections. We run an election every year. Next year is going to be municipals. And that's where the people who really affect your day to day life, like your city taxes, your roads, all that, those are the folks who are being elected next year. And that's where you're going to see an immediate change is in that realm. Yes. Federal is very important. So don't, you know, don't think. I'm not saying that. But, you know, your local and your regional elections and then even your congress, right, those are coming in two years. Those are going to be big elections to follow because, you know, your president can only do so much. They don't have a legislating body behind them. Right. So staying involved is really going to be it. Don't just sleep every three years and then wake up and like, oh dang, we got a vote now. It's real. Yeah, it's real.

00:41:46 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
And Erica, that's such an important point. And that's also why we're doing this podcast, right? Because we do feel like actually we have access in like right here. You know, we had a privilege. We live in Durham, so the state house is like a 30 minutes drive up the road. We can just go to the state house and be like, hey, who are you? What do you care about? This is who I am. So I really hope that folks will take you up on that and really hear you. And also, here's a plug for hosting a down ballot brunch with your homies to talk about these issues. This is why we're doing this. Go back to your community, have the conversations and do some good listening. Yeah. So we have just a couple more questions.

00:42:26 - Erica Porter
Okay.

00:42:27 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
The last big one is, what are you dreaming for North Carolina?

00:42:32 - Erica Porter
That's hard. You know, everybody asks me, where are you from? Where are you from? And I still say Louisiana, but I'm really from North Carolina. Yeah. And if you look at everything I do, it's to make North Carolina better. Whether that's, you know, in the community I live and work in, whether it's the elections, whether it's art, how I got to meet Monet. I just hope for a future where people can be their authentic selves one and not get. Not get accosted for who they are, that they can go out and exercise the rights that we all have as Americans and not be accosted. Right. There's a theme here, if you get it. But I just want people to just be them, to be able to just live their lives. I want everybody to be able to give back to a society that will give back to them, too, and not put all the work in for a society that isn't there for them. And I think North Carolina is an amazing state. We've got beaches, we've got mountains, we got the middle. We've got a little bit of all kinds of flavors. Right. We don't want to talk about the barbecue because I'm not from here, so we're not going to go there. Wow.

00:43:50 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Ooh.

00:43:52 - Erica Porter
Not eating north. I just want for North Carolinians to be successful and whatever that success means for them, not monetary success or, you know, whatever it means for them. And to do it without hindrance and without bad actors coming out and trying to change their minds. It sounds hopeful. It sounds like a fairy tale book. But I think we can get there if we all pay attention. And, yes, we do have different opinions on how we should get there, but I think we can get there.

00:44:31 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
I agree.

00:44:33 - Quay Weston
Love it. We ready for our last five?

00:44:35 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Ready.

00:44:36 - Erica Porter
Here's our, uh. Oh.

00:44:37 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Our hot fire question.

00:44:39 - Quay Weston
Okay.

00:44:39 - Erica Porter
Okay.

00:44:39 - Quay Weston
Okay, here we go. One Pepsi Cola or cheerwine?

00:44:44 - Erica Porter
Cheerwine.

00:44:45 - Quay Weston
Okay. Bojangles are cookout.

00:44:47 - Erica Porter
Oof. Popeyes.

00:44:50 - Quay Weston
Wait a minute.

00:44:52 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
She did say she's from Louisiana.

00:44:54 - Erica Porter
I am from Louisiana. Okay, I'll go bojangles.

00:44:58 - Quay Weston
Okay. Sweet or unsweet?

00:45:00 - Erica Porter
Sweet.

00:45:01 - Quay Weston
Unc or Duke?

00:45:03 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Mm.

00:45:04 - Quay Weston
I wish you said you went to states, right?

00:45:06 - Erica Porter
So I'm going Duke.

00:45:08 - Quay Weston
Dang. You ain't just gonna say state?

00:45:10 - Erica Porter
You're not even gonna lean on state? You didn't give me the two options.

00:45:13 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
When I answered these. I answered none of these.

00:45:15 - Quay Weston
Yeah, there's a possibilities.

00:45:16 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Yeah.

00:45:16 - Erica Porter
Okay. I mean, obviously, I'm state all day.

00:45:18 - Quay Weston
But if you had to choose one of the two.

00:45:20 - Erica Porter
Unc or Duke. I'm going duke.

00:45:22 - Quay Weston
Well, I mean, we are in Durham, so I guess that's okay. Last one. Your favorite North Carolina artist.

00:45:29 - Erica Porter
Only because a large picture of myself is hanging in my. My apartment. So William Paul Thomas painted that, and I'm a big fan.

00:45:39 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Shout out to William Paul Thomas.

00:45:42 - Erica Porter
Yeah, yeah.

00:45:43 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
And it's a beautiful portrait.

00:45:44 - Quay Weston
Yes.

00:45:44 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
If I find a photo, I might just do it from your instagram and post it, please, because it's. Yeah, he did it. He did it with that one. Erica, thank you so much for taking time out to come be with us today and educate us. I know. I learned so much, and, you know, when we started this, you were one of the people at the top of my list that I wanted to talk to. So thank you so much for making that happen.

00:46:04 - Erica Porter
Thank you for having me. You know, I'll come back whenever. Okay. Go ahead and say that if you ever have any questions, come find me. Yeah.

00:46:11 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Cause post election, we might.

00:46:12 - Erica Porter
Okay.

00:46:14 - Quay Weston
We probably can have some questions after.

00:46:15 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
You'Re rested and hydrated.

00:46:17 - Erica Porter
Yes. So after Christmas, okay. Cause I'm serious.

00:46:21 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
No, 2020.

00:46:22 - Erica Porter
We were going till Christmas. Cause we have recounts.

00:46:25 - Quay Weston
That's right. Up until January.

00:46:27 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Yeah. Well, let's hope that that doesn't happen this time. And y'all, that's all we got for today.

00:46:33 - Quay Weston
Facts.

00:46:33 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Yeah.

00:46:34 - Quay Weston
Thank you.

00:46:35 - Erica Porter
That was fun.

00:46:36 - Quay Weston
Yeah.

00:46:37 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Great job. Thanks for tuning in to down ballad banter. We hope y'all enjoy diving into the tentacular world of local politics with us.

00:46:53 - Quay Weston
Yeah. And don't forget, this podcast is an extension of Monet's beautiful dream, the down ballot brunch, where there are three simple steps. It's to eat, have a conversation, and to act.

00:47:04 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
That's right, have a conversation using this podcast episode, the down ballot brunch chat guide, or your own prompts. Write a note to an elected official on a down ballot brunch postcard. Share quotes from your convo on social media, with consent, of course, or text three friends about their voting plans and find out what matters to them.

00:47:24 - Quay Weston
And if you're watching on YouTube, be sure to, like, share subscribe. If you're listening on other platforms, be sure to rate and review share it with your people.

00:47:33 - Monèt Noelle Marshall
Until next time, stay informed, stay engaged, and keep up with the down ballot banter.