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America Voted, But Not Everyone Had Their Say

The 2018 midterms had the highest voter turnout in North Carolina in decades. But voters faced some problems at the polls.
Erik Hersman
/
Creative Commons https://bit.ly/1ezRl1S
The 2018 midterms had the highest voter turnout in North Carolina in decades. But voters faced some problems at the polls.
The 2018 midterms had the highest voter turnout in North Carolina in decades. But voters faced some problems at the polls.
Credit Erik Hersman / Creative Commons https://bit.ly/1ezRl1S
/
Creative Commons https://bit.ly/1ezRl1S
The 2018 midterms had the highest voter turnout in North Carolina in decades. But voters faced some problems at the polls.

2018 midterm voter turnout in North Carolina was the highest its been in decades. But not everyone who wanted to cast a ballot was able to do so. A pre-election analysis from WRAL showed that a change in early voting requirements disproportionately affected rural and poor voters in North Carolina. Frank Stasio talks to WRAL investigative reporter Tyler Dukes and North Carolina Central University School of Law professor Irving Joyner about the ongoing gaps in voter access for North Carolinians.

Residents in those counties were further away from their polling place than voters in wealthy or urban counties. And on election day, aging machines and a lack of education on voting rules posed challenges for voters.

Host Frank Stasio talks to WRAL investigative reporter Tyler Dukes about his reporting and scholar Irving Joyner about the ongoing gaps in voter access for North Carolinians. Joyner is a professor at the North Carolina Central University School of Law.

Copyright 2018 North Carolina Public Radio

Longtime NPR correspondent Frank Stasio was named permanent host of The State of Things in June 2006. A native of Buffalo, Frank has been in radio since the age of 19. He began his public radio career at WOI in Ames, Iowa, where he was a magazine show anchor and the station's News Director.
Amanda Magnus grew up in Maryland and went to high school in Baltimore. She became interested in radio after an elective course in the NYU journalism department. She got her start at Sirius XM Satellite Radio, but she knew public radio was for her when she interned at WNYC. She later moved to Madison, where she worked at Wisconsin Public Radio for six years. In her time there, she helped create an afternoon drive news magazine show, called Central Time. She also produced several series, including one on Native American life in Wisconsin. She spends her free time running, hiking, and roller skating. She also loves scary movies.