For the last two elections held in Maryland I have used the accessible electronic ballot delivery system that is now available to Maryland voters with disabilities thanks to a lawsuit that was brought by the National Federation of the Blind against the Maryland State Board of Elections. However, prior to 2014 I voted at my local polling place using the audio ballot feature on the accessible Diebold AccuVote voting machine.

My experience as a blind voter has varied widely depending on how well poll workers were trained on how to enable the audio ballot. Sometimes, the poll workers knew what they needed to do to enable the audio ballot. For the majority of elections, however, the audio ballot did not start when I inserted the voter access card into the voting machine.

Whenever a blind or low vision voter arrives at her polling place and is told that the accessible voting machine is not available or is not working, or if she experiences problems with the machine while voting, she must also become a voting rights advocate and assert her right to vote privately and independently. My experience voting in the November 2010 election is an example of how to do this. 

When I arrived at my polling place on Election Day in November, 2010, I told the poll worker that I wanted to use the audio ballot, and reminded her to check the box, when loading the voter access card, to enable the audio ballot. From the reaction of the poll worker, I was fairly certain that she was unfamiliar with the steps she needed to take to enable the audio ballot, but I took the card from her, put on the headphones, and inserted it into the accessible voting machine. As I expected, there was no audio. I informed the poll workers of this, and again reminded them of what they needed to do. While the poll workers looked over their instruction manuals, I was offered the opportunity to vote using the touch screen, vote with assistance on a provisional ballot, and, for a second time, to vote using the touch screen. Each time, I politely, but firmly, refused and asserted my right to vote privately and independently using the audio ballot. After about fifteen minutes, the poll workers were able to figure out how to enable the audio ballot, and I was able to exercise my fundamental right to vote privately and independently.

While most Americans take the right to vote privately and independently for granted, blind and low vision Americans have only been able to exercise this fundamental right since the passage of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) in 2001. Today, in 2016, poor poll worker training continues to be a barrier to our exercise of this right. Whenever barriers are encountered, we must firmly, but politely, assert our right to vote privately and independently. However, if a blind voter is unable to vote privately and independently for any reason, it is vital that she vote with assistance to make her voice heard, and then file a complaint with her Secretary of State’s office to make election officials aware of the problem. Without the ability to exercise the fundamental right to vote privately and independently, blind Americans will never be full and equal citizens.