In three months, I will be eligible to vote for the first time. But as a disabled person, will I really be able to? Complications from my disability could mean that in some states I would be excluded from the voting process.  

There are over 38 million disabled voters in the United States. However, systemic voting inaccessibility is a still a reality in many states and at many polling places for the disabled community.  As a result, there are consequential gaps in voter turn-out between disabled and able-bodied voters, approximately a 7 percent disparity. With barriers such as absentee ballot restrictions, lack of assistive technology, and physical obstacles, such as stairs and long lines, many disabled voters are left behind. With the recent Disability Voting Rights Week, it is vital that we acknowledge the scourge on democracy that this voter disenfranchisement causes.

  Imagine wanting to vote, while sitting in a wheelchair at your polling place, looking up at an insurmountable flight of stairs. For many disabled people, absentee ballots are the difference between voting and not voting. During the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, at least 30 states made it much easier to vote by absentee ballot, adding to the several other states that had already been encouraging no-excuse absentee ballots.

     Unfortunately, as a backlash to expanded voting options during the height of the pandemic, many states have passed laws recently that curtail voting accessibility, including some laws that the judiciary has found to be in violation of the Civil Rights Act.