MADISON, Wis. — Madison leaders gathered Thursday to express their support for disability voting rights as the November election inches closer.
Just last week, the bipartisan Wisconsin Elections Commission approved a new set of rules allowing voters with disabilities to get help from others when submitting absentee ballots, which disability rights advocates have heralded as a win for disabled voters.
During the Thursday morning event outside of Madison’s municipal building, Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway said the decision was a win for a group that historically faced significant barriers when casting a ballot.
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“If voters with disabilities voted at the same rate as people without disabilities, they would represent a voting block of one-point-seven-five-million voters,” Rhodes-Conway said. “However, historically there have been significant gaps in voter turnout for people with disabilities.”
Jim Verbick, Madison’s deputy clerk, said there are many types of accommodations the city can make for voters who need them, including absentee ballots in brail, allowing curbside voting for those who have difficulty standing, and allowing someone to help with marking ballots, among other things.
Express vote machines, which Madison voters who need help marking ballots can access at any polling place, offer accommodations like touchpads, braille keypads, large-and-high-contrast print, and headphones if a voter needs the ballot read to them.
Still, disabled voters have and often do run into issues when trying to access specialized equipment.
Denise Jess, executive director of the Wisconsin Council of the Blind & Visually Impaired, said voters have faced issues with accessing resources around the state, which is why it’s important for election workers to make sure the equipment is set up and ready.
“When you use that accessible voting equipment as a voter, you help liberate all of us, by making the equipment known and helping poll workers see the value of that equipment,” she said.
City leaders said voting access is a civil rights issue too, especially since the 1968 passage of Title II of ADA, which guarantees people of all abilities a full and equal opportunity to vote in state and federal elections.
According to data from the CDC, one in five adults in Wisconsin has a disability.
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