Election Day can’t be made a federal holiday. Unless we decide to mandate that all businesses close on that holiday. Well, to clarify my point… making election day a holiday would do little to increase voting by those who already find it a challenge.
If you went to any kind of store today (Thanksgiving Day), you can see how well making a day a holiday results in giving everyone time. A lot of businesses open. People work- and they are often the lowest wage workers, hoping for holiday-pay, who work. McDonalds, Walmart, 7-11, etc. But also many professional workers- those in IT especially.
When you think of national holidays, do you realize how many people are still working on those days?
Hey, Markos- Do you have any staff that are “scheduled” to work on Thanksgiving? If you unscheduled them, what would happen if you had a server issue that you had to resolve (website down) and your IT providers weren’t available because of the voting holiday? What would your advertisers say if your website was down, their ads weren’t being served, and they couldn’t get ahold of your people?
Mail-In Ballots Are Bad Too
Because a harshly patriarchal family can be easily required to vote a certain way. “Hey, let’s all sit down at the table and fill in our ballots- and I will mail them for you.”
Extended In-Person Voting
I think the only viable solution is perhaps a week-long opportunity to vote in person. This gives people enough time to be flexible- and gives them the ability to vote in private, even from their family.