The 2020 Election From a Houstonians Standpoint
In midst of a global pandemic and the largest ever Black Lives Matter movement, the United States is in an presidential election year.
This election is unlike any other election in history, and is presumably the most historic.
The United States projected a record high voter turnout rate according to CNN Politics website which is a result of a greater number of registered voters including young voters as well as minority voters.
A vast majority of these young voters turnout was a direct result of spreading awareness and demonstrating the importance of these practices through social media.
Whether the information through these platforms be true or not, people can agree that social media has showed a great impact on the election.
As candidates and news networks have utilized these platforms to share information about campaigns and inform the general public, it has proven to be one of the most influential platforms.
Democrats in Houston have taken great strides in this presidential election to flip Texas into a blue state. Although, historically speaking Texas has been considerably a red state.
After seeing that many minorities and young voters took action in this election, many people believed that this would be the election that would turn Texas purple or even blue.
Major Texas cities like Houston, Dallas, Austin and San Antonio were labeled blue in this election with record high turnout, but contrary to many beliefs, Texas did not stray away from falling red.
Houston in particular has witnessed a record voter turnout for Early voting as well as the election as a whole.
Counties like Harris County and Ford Bend County have seen voter turnout like no other election in history.
In addition to this turnout, just a day before Election Day a group of Texas Republicans petitioned to invalidate almost 127 thousand drive-through votes in Harris County.
The votes in this county had already made up 9% of the total votes in all 50 states.
The Petition argued that drive-through voting violated federal law and nine of the ten voting sites are located in predominantly democratic areas The Texas Supreme Court denied this petition as well as other attempts to invalidate these drive-through ballots.
At the NRG Arena, one of the largest voting sites in Harris County, 30 minutes after the polls opened on Election Day, there was already a line wrapped multiple times.
This site was also home to one of the ten drive-through locations in Harris County which was removed before Election Day after the GOP’s petition. The county clerk, Chris Hollins enacted on this to ensure the safety of each vote.
All but one drive-through voting site was open leaving The Toyota Center as the only place for voters to utilize this method of voting.
