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We Must Organize a Voting Bloc of Incarcerated People

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After the D.C. Council’s historic passage of the Restore the Vote Amendment Act that gave incarcerated people convicted of felonies the right to vote in 2020, I composed a brief missive, detailing my observations of the voter registration process for a D.C. prisoner here at USP Big Sandy in Martin County, Kentucky. I mailed a copy to Mayor Muriel Bowser’s office.

In the letter, I thanked Mayor Bowser and the Council for restoring our right to vote and for the opportunity to make our collective voices heard. I also volunteered to help with any efforts to improve on prison voter education and registration and suggested plans for get-out-the-vote drives directed toward our families, friends, and returned citizens.

I requested information and materials that could assist me in educating myself and my fellow D.C. prisoners about the importance and value of exercising our new enfranchisement. Unfortunately, no one from Mayor Bowser’s office bothered to reply. 

In light of Bowser’s ill-conceived and misguided decision to veto the Revised Criminal Code Act, the silence from her office is not surprising to me as a prisoner from the nation’s capital.

I hear White politicians, law enforcement spokespeople, and right-wing media personalities advocating the tough-on-crime line. And when I hear Black elected officials like Mayor Bowser regurgitate the same rhetoric, I reflect back to Black activist Isaiah T. Montgomery, who argued that illiterate Black people should be denied the right to vote.

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Written by enovate

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