Disability Deep Dive Podcast

Episode Transcript

Maddie Crowley:  You're listening to "You First", the Disability Rights Florida podcast. On this episode of "Your Voice, Your Vote", our podcast series all about voting and disability issues, we're going to learn about intersectionality and how marginalized voters are impacted in the election process.

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Maddie:  Hi, there. I'm Maddie.

Keith Casebonne:  Keith.

Maddie:  We're the hosts of You First. On the previous episode of our series Your Voice, Your Vote, we talked with two Florida based blind disability voting activists who are trailblazers in the disability community and help make accessible voting in Florida a reality.

It was a great conversation, so check it out if you haven't yet.

Keith:  Yeah, it was. Today, we're happy to have on another Florida friend, Jazlyn Gallego from VoteRiders. Jazlyn is VoteRiders' Florida State Outreach Director and Florida Voter ID Coalition Coordinator. She brings incredible knowledge to this conversation and has a deep belief and love for advocacy work.

Maddie:  For sure. It was so nice to chat with Jazlyn and learn more about the barriers in place against not just voters with disabilities, but voters of all backgrounds and identities. Jazlyn will also take us through some helpful information about voter ID requirements in Florida and other election resources that we hope you will find useful.

Hi, Jazlyn. Thank you so much for being on the podcast today. We're so excited to have you here to talk about Florida voting ID and how this impacts the disability community and communities beyond that. Thank you so much for being here.

Jazlyn Gallego:  Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me, Maddie. I'm really excited to have this conversation with you about our work and how voters in Florida can stay prepared ahead of the primary elections and the general election.

Maddie:  Awesome. Thank you so much.

Tell our listeners a little bit about yourself, how you got started in this work, what you're currently doing for voting and voting ID related work in the state of Florida.

Jazlyn:  Absolutely. My name is Jazlyn Gallego. I am a Florida coordinator, as well as a state outreach director for VoteRiders. VoteRiders is a national 501(c)(3) focusing solely on voter ID. We just celebrated our 10‑year anniversary back in April, actually.

Maddie:  Wow! Congratulations.

Jazlyn:  Thank you so much. We did a bunch of the celebratory initiatives out in the community. In April, we hosted a lot of what we call our ID clinics or events where we host events to be able to order documents in local communities. Everywhere we went, we brought some cupcakes and some balloons to celebrate. It's been great.

When VoteRiders was established 10 years ago, our founder, Kathleen Unger, founded VoteRiders because, at that time, there were many voter registration organizations but there was no organization at that time that focused solely on voter ID or the ID that you need to bring with you when you go to vote. That's what voter ID is.

Many organizations at that time that did voter registration were registering folks to vote, but then went a little bit to ask about ID or say, "I don't think that I have the right ID to go and vote." Being able to create this organization, our efforts still are to be complementary to these organizations that do voter registration work.

As opposed to trying to jump in and replicate efforts, we're trying to do the voter ID assistance because it is so costly, it's so time‑consuming, and it is very tedious at times. That's something that we've been trying to do, and for the past 10 years, it's worked really well.

50 percent of our work is working with these democracy organizations that do voter registration, get‑out‑to‑vote efforts, and the other 50 percent is with what I call social service organizations. Organizations like homeless shelters, case management for people who are in‑house.

We have put organizations at our food pantries or local community centers to try to get in touch with folks that are at risk of not having an ID, more so because of the costs. I think that I missed your original question, which was, tell me about yourself and your work.

As VoterRiders, essentially my role is to build partnerships in the state of Florida with all those organizations that I just named. As of today, we have over 50 in the state of Florida. Then as of 2021, I'm also in charge of building relationships in all of our target states where we don't have a coordinator on the ground.

It's amazing to be able to read on voter ID laws and the changes of them and the updates, and what folks are doing in the organizing space and other states around the country to be able to obtain insight on what might happen in Florida versus how we might react and what campaigns we might start.

It's been wonderful to be with VoteRiders for the past four and a half years. I'm super grateful to do this work because it's so one‑on‑one service based with a voter. You get to hear everyone's personal story of what they're going through and why they're so empowered to vote. Then in addition to that, get to know all these great organizations that are doing this work.

Maddie:  Definitely. We are so happy to have you here and to talk with us, a representative from VoteRiders, which is such a wonderful organization that has such a huge impact on not just Florida, but the country as a whole.

Continuing to grow as an organization, continuing to have such a huge and massive impact on citizens and folks trying to attain the proper ID to be able to vote and navigate life as a whole. I'm just hearing that this work really filled a niche that was so needed like 10 years ago.

I'm sure has the impact of your work has been so fruitful and so important to citizens in the need for them to have the proper identification to vote. With that, I want to start a little basic for folks that might be listening that are new to voting, maybe don't know much about kind of the qualifications and requirements to vote, and what kind of some stipulations may be.

Starting a little basic, what is a voter ID? What does that look like in Florida?

Jazlyn:  Absolutely. Voter ID simply put, it's the ID that you are required to bring to your polling place when you go vote. On our website, votewriter.org, you can find a map and it's very interactive. You can click on the state where you live in the US and check out your state's voter ID laws.

There is a strict ID law state, there is none strict ID, and then there is no ID law. In states with strict ID law, like Georgia, you can only vote with a driver's license or state id. In the State of Florida, you can vote with a list of different IDs. It's called none strict. I'll go ahead and read off what is allowed in Florida.

You can bring a driver's license, a state ID, a US passport, a debit or credit card, a military ID, a student ID, a retirement center ID, a neighborhood association ID, a public assistance ID, a Veteran's Health ID, a license to carry, or an employee ID card issued by the federal government, State of Florida, county municipality, or other entity in Florida.

The important thing to know is that you can mix and match these. This year I voted with my student ID and I voted with my library card. You have to have, at some point, have gotten a library card with an ID. That's like that go around.

My student ID doesn't have a signature panel on it, but my ID card on my library card does, and that's government‑issued. That was obtained through using my driver's license at another point in time. You have to make sure that you have something with a photo on this list and something with a signature panel on this list.

They don't have to be the same thing. For example, I could have also used my debit or credit card as a signature panel in addition to using my student ID as a photo. Those are some options that we have. Our goal at VoteRiders is always to try to get folks a driver's license or a state ID, because that is what's most widely accepted nationwide.

We never know when the ID laws are changing, so we want to go ahead and be a little bit more proactive and be able to help get people their state ID or driver's license.

Often citizens are coming to us and asking for ID primarily because they need it for something else in their lives, like to be able to get a job or a housing application completed, or something along those lines, or even to go to the doctor.

I've had one, actually on two occasions, I've had someone tell me that I saved their life because they were unable to go to the doctor due to not having an ID. Typically, it's the other sort of resources that are commonly occurring in our lives that we need to be able to utilize, like doctors, job applications, housing applications.

It's being able to access those items that is typically what sending people to VoteRiders. However, it's also an opportunity for us to engage with them and talk to them about voter ID and voting.

Maddie:  Hearing you talk about that, I'm just reflecting on the amount of times I've had to show my ID in the past week and just across every aspect of my life, whether it's at the doctor's office or some other place where you're showing identification to pick up a prescription, or like you said, housing and employment and all of those things are so important.

It's crucial that folks that are listening know the ins and outs of not only the options they have for voting, which they need a, like you said, like a signature and something with a photo, but also your efforts to streamline the process and get them more of a official ID with those two things together, which is so incredibly important.

Jazlyn:  Yes. Because at the same time, poor workers are humans. Even though they're trained by the county and they go through this extensive training, I've gone through it before myself. We're sole people and we often forget, especially when voting laws are changing, voter ID laws are changing, becoming more strict.

You might accidentally not allow someone to vote because you see someone come in with their student ID and also their library card. I got like a strange reaction when I did pull them up, but they took a second and they were like, "Oh yeah, you're fine."

It was delayed to response to, "Oh, that's something that's totally allowed because it's not thought about before." As opposed to if you were to just walk in with a driver's license, there's no question about it. Go ahead and walk on through.

Maddie:  It's important that we're having this conversation, and for folks that are listening, that they have the knowledge and the self‑advocacy skills if they are to encounter a poll worker that may have forgotten that they know that this is this is the law too. This is important that we're sharing about this.

Thinking about Florida as a whole, what are some of the voter ID laws in the state, and maybe if you want to touch on how that differs from a state, like how you mentioned Georgia, which has stricter voter ID laws?

Jazlyn:  Absolutely. That is the current state voter ID law in the state of Florida is that you have to be able to present one of the items that I just listed off at the polling place. However, now as of spring 2021, you now have to present either your Florida driver's license or your social security number when you register to vote due to Senate Bill 90.

Then really great turn of events this July Senate Bill 144 was passed, which allows voters attaching to financial hardship to obtain a free state ID.

Maddie:  Wow.

Jazlyn:  Yeah, I really wanted to make sure that everyone knew about Senate Bill 144, because it should be a really simple process to go to the DMV and be able to attest to your financial hardship if you have your voter registration, and let them know that you need a free state ID.

I believe it's a non‑driving state ID. If you need a driver's license, call VoteRiders 844‑338‑8743. Once again, that's 844‑338‑8743 and we will cover the cost of your driver's license.

Maddie:  Wow. Now that I'm thinking about it and we're talking, just reflecting on how I think folks don't often think about all of the costs that go into getting an ID, whether that's actually paying for the physical ID or have access to driving a car so you can learn how to drive a car, then to thus get your driver's application and have transportation to that appointment.

Then I'm sure there's other fees and stipulations that kind of go beyond that. Could you talk a little bit about those financial barriers that exist for folks? You mentioned that VoteRiders has this program that can cover ID costs, and that the recent Senate bill allows for folks who are experiencing financial hardship to get a free ID.

Can you speak a little bit to that financial economic barrier that exists for folks that people might not think about as deterring people from obtaining an ID?

Jazlyn:  Absolutely. I love that question, Maddie. I'll start off with this. Usually when I start off in my community trainings about voter ID, I ask folks how much do they think an ID or driver's license costs. Mattie, how much do you think an ID or driver's license would cost overall?

Maddie:  Oh gosh, it's been so long since I got my driver's license. Maybe around $40, $45.

Jazlyn:  That's about the average guess that someone would give for having their ID or driver's license. The reality is that it is different for everyone, but it's going to be most expensive for married women, or women that have ever been married before who are moving to a new state.

That is what is going to get the very most expensive when women from out of state that have been married before, are moving to the State of Florida. Because then we have the cost of obtaining a marriage certificate to prove that the name on your birth certificate is the person that is behind the counter with now a new last name.

That on average alone is $50. then that woman is also having to get her birth certificate. That on average alone, is probably around $40, $50 as well. then the driver's license, which on average is $64. I've had people ask me if you go up to your state's website and you fill out that mail application, it should only be under $10.

Right. That's for someone that already has an ID. We're talking about someone that does not have an ID or driver's license. We encounter that catch 22 of having to go through the Vital Statistics Office or the Health Department Office where you were born or married, and go through this process where you're ordering an application and answering a field of security questions to verify your identity because you're not able to go ahead and provide a scan copy of your driver's license.

Someone without an ID has to go ahead and go through those costs. Oftentimes, I have dealt with people that have moved to Florida after Hurricane Maria, after the earthquakes in Puerto Rico because they had to get up and leave in the middle of the night.

Austin women that are suffering from more often domestic abuse, having to flee without their document. Different circumstances of people allow them to leave without their documents. I know I often get a question of, "Why would you leave without your birth certificate? Why don't you have that? Who would lose...?"

Emergencies do happen, and it's very possible for you to have those documents damaged or not come with you. It's a real reality that people face and more often than not. The overall costs so far that we've gotten to with just the averages is we have about $164 that we're looking at on the more expensive end.

However, it can also differ too. There are also things that the State of Florida has put into place to make sure that cost is driven down the majority of the time for those below the poverty line.

For example, if you are a recipient of SNAP benefits, then you can come in with your, I think it's Department of Children and Families who, I'm not mistaken, your SNAP letter that states that you're receiving SNAP benefits and you'll be able to receive that ID for a cost of five dollars just a safety.

If you are someone that is homeless, you can come in with your shelter letter or a work letter from a work agency, and you'll be able to receive that non‑driving state ID for a cost of zero dollars again, and a driver's license would drop from $64 to $31.

There are things that will drive the cost down. Then veterans always receive their ID for a dollar as well. There are things that are put into place and now we have Senate Bill 144 allowing people that are attesting to any financial hardship.

Before you had to meet those requirements, you had to be homeless, you had to be a SNAP recipient. Now it's anyone that's saying that they're going through financial hardship can come into the DMV with their voter registration card and, "I needed an ID and I'm going through financial hardship."

Now we're just left VoteRiders, hopefully, fingers crossed is just left with helping folks get those preliminary documents that they need to bring to DMV. When you go to the DMV, you need to bring your first certificate, your Social security card, and two proofs of address.

The two proofs of address need to be spelled exactly the same. For example, you can't have ST abbreviation on one and then street abbreviation on the other, but they don't necessarily have to be in your name.

If you just moved to the State of Florida and you're staying with Uncle Jimmy, Uncle Jimmy's name can be on the piece of mail. You just need to let the person at the counter know that you're staying with Uncle Jimmy.

That helps us to be able to just focus on ordering preliminary documents, hopefully, which still cost a good amount depending on the person's situation. I once assisted a woman that was from Pennsylvania and she came to Daytona.

She was had stage three cancer and was going through chemo, and she was so scared. She said, "I've been lucky so far, but everyone has been allowing me to go to doctors' offices in my state. However..." In state being like for health state, health condition.

However, she's like, "I feel like at any moment I'm going to be turned away and I'm not going to be able to get the medical attention that I need."

I met her on a Saturday. Spent all day Sunday trying to get everything ordered, pleading to the Department of Health in Pennsylvania, the Vital Statistics Office in Pennsylvania, telling them she has stage III cancer and we've got to move on this.

Luckily, everyone was able to come together. She had been married two times. Needed a birth certificate. Was able to get her documents sent to a relative that sent them to her. Then, we got it essentially overnight.

The cost of that was the most expensive I'd ever seen. It was about $300...

Maddie:  Wow.

Jazlyn:  ...worth this cost. This is someone that's was going through cancer therapy at the time, which is already so incredibly expensive.

Often we're seeing IDs being incredibly useful to people aside from voting, but the reality is that they're not going to be able to tell their story about how difficult maybe circumstances are for medical resources, or how difficult things are after escaping a national disaster and coming to Florida if they're not able to get out and vote and have that ID for voting.

Our hope is that we're uplifting these people's stories and that they're able to uplift their stories at the polls.

Maddie:  Yeah, definitely. Wow. Those two stories really just showcase all of the hoops that folks have to jump through in order to get necessary ID just to get the basic necessities that they need to quite literally survive.

Those stories are incredibly impactful, and I hope that the listeners of this podcast are able to take away and reflect on the ins and outs of this system and kind of the red tape that exists that can make somebody's life very difficult.

I know you touched on how women in FEMs who are experiencing hardship, or medical treatments and costliness of that, folks that are quite literally escaping disasters and abuse potentially. Could you speak to how voting laws and restrictions, or like this red tape that you're talking about, can impact other marginalized groups, including, but not limited to the disability community?

Jazlyn:  Absolutely, and I love that question because the same groups that have been historically marginalized are still really being marginalized today. It's more often women because we're more likely to change our names when we get married and communities of color, low income communities, students, elderly, but also people with disabilities.

These are for different reasons. Women, it's because we're more likely to change our names when we get married so we have to provide that additional marriage certificate that I mentioned.

Communities of color are more likely to be...not go to the polls due to not having an ID because of the cost of getting the ID and because of that overlap, the intersectionality, as communities of color being more likely to be below the poverty line.

Then, also, trans and nonbinary communities. That is an incredibly expensive and incredibly thorough ID process that is so [inaudible 21:08] to mean to change someone's name and then have them get all their proper documentation.

Then, people with disabilities, because our handwriting changes as we get older or our muscular ability has changed. That is a major issue of having to make sure that our identifications are up to date with what reflects our current signature, in addition to issues getting to the DMV.

We would have to often supply a medical van or a lift that would be able to accommodate for a wheelchair. Think about the ability to drive. We have a corporate partnership with both Uber and Lyft now. We are still providing rides, I believe, to the polls, too.

I have had people cry to me and say, "I would never have been able to make this journey to the DMV myself, even though I live a mile or two from the DMV," in one case. This woman said that she would never have been to walk there because she had a disability.

Us being able to provide a Lyft for her made all of the difference to get to the DMV. It can be something as simple as a ride for communities of people with disabilities. There was one gentleman who was unable to drive and obviously was [inaudible 22:19] .

He had his very first identification in three years because he had been waiting to get on a bus route that time correlated with his DMV time. He was unable to get to the DMV for three years. He said before he's gone, he's missed his appointment because the bus was late. There were issues with the bus.

Us being able to provide a ride made a difference in this man's life that he hadn't seen in several years. In addition to that, we've also heard stories about cameras being mounted to desks at the DMV and then someone that's in a wheelchair is unable to be seen by the camera at the DMV.

There are common...I guess a lack of awareness of what is needed to be able to be adequate and comply with maybe it's ADA, or just to be able to serve communities of people that are in wheelchairs to be able to make sure that they can also have simple things like their picture taken at the DMV.

Maddie:  Thank you for contextualizing what this could look like for various marginalized communities, both individually, but also I know you touched on intersectionality.

When you think about folks who hold multiple of those identities, how those barriers to DMV, or some kind of ID facility, or accessing transportation. Like you said, those barriers just continue to stack up on top of that person.

That's not fair, obviously. We recognize that. I appreciate how you contextualize that and also gave examples of how VoteRiders does show up for those folks and is able to bridge that gap inequity for communities that truly need it. I appreciate you giving that background and providing those examples.

Also, what I'm wondering, we've talked about voting and we've talked briefly about how folks have needed IDs for medical care or to submit housing applications. What could ID laws or needing an ID impact folks beyond going to the polls, whether they're returning citizens trying to get their rights back after being incarcerated, whether they're seeking employment?

We were just reflecting earlier about all the ways in which we've had to show our IDs just in the past week and there's so many barriers. I'm just curious, what does that look like beyond voting for folks?

Jazlyn:  That's a wonderful question. Let's jump into the returning citizens' aspect for a quick second. We partner super closely with Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, which is an organization that mobilized and pushed for amendment to get on the ballot in 2018 and ultimately for many returning citizens to have their rights restored in 2018.

Folks that are returning citizens and have questions about their eligibility should call the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition. They're a coalition that is entirely made up of returning citizens that are looking to empower one another and lift one another up in their communities.

Be able to fight against housing discrimination, and be able to help each other search for employment, and ultimately factors that lower recidivism. I'll jump back to that in a second. Their phone number is 407‑901‑3749. Once again, that's 407‑901‑3749.

We partner together a lot because, like I mentioned, they will host resource fairs to be able to make sure that people that are coming out of incarceration are getting back up on their feet, and also to ultimately lower the rates of recidivism.

For folks that don't know, recidivism is a rate to which someone would return to incarceration. Getting someone an ID allows them to be able to get a job, to be able to get housing, and those are two major factors of lowering recidivism in addition to voting.

Although I can't speak in detail to who is able to vote, I believe it's those that have paid their fines and fees, they're off of probation should be eligible to register to vote and get out and vote. Again, call the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition if you have any doubt. That's going to be super important that you get in touch with them before registering.

However, we have been partnering with them year‑round because IDs can often take a long time to arrive. Its documents can take a long time to order and get to your doorstep. Then, in addition to that, we are meeting the needs of the communities that are going to be needing those IDs, especially if you've been incarcerated, you likely might have expired documents.

We are also taking care of that for those that are eligible to vote. Might have had expired documents, and then had gotten to either be unemployed for a long time afterwards and they might have their filing fees paid off, might be done with probation, and at this point are just waiting for that next step.

Often, that's the scenario that we're in with partnering with them. We often hear that it provides more than just their ability to go out and vote. It's also making sure that they are not returning to incarceration.

Maddie:  Thank you for contextualizing that. I'm just hearing the massive amount of importance of the work that y'all do.

Obviously, there's such an unfortunate stigma for folks that are returning citizens and trying to get back to whatever situation, or employment, or life that they once had before incarceration.

Just the level of impact at an organization like VoteRiders to alleviate some of those stressors to provide and offer support to getting that ID back and supporting them in that process is going to have a major impact on their ability to, like you said, not only vote but access all of the services and resources that they need in other aspects of their life.

We talked a little bit about rights restoration for folks who are recently or previously incarcerated. What does that look like maybe beyond that community for other folks generally in their ability to access housing or employment? How does ID play a big role in that?

Jazlyn:  Absolutely. I would like to also first mention voting isn't on the forefront of people's minds that are just trying to make it through the day‑to‑day and make sure that they are surviving and focusing on survival.

When we take away that aspect of no longer having to focus on survival because they have that ID to be able to get them into even a homeless shelter, we are then able to move forward and have a conversation about how civics plays a bigger role in the day to day movement of their lives.

I would say it's one awareness that we get to discuss given that we are providing something that is so necessary to people. We often encounter people that are in poverty when we meet them because they are unable to be housed.

Then by the time that we check back on them a couple of months later, they're often a lot more stable. It's something great for us to see that we are truly making an impact.

We have started doing some banking in terms of calling the people that we have already assisted, but we're calling them wellness phone banks because we're asking them, "How are you? Last time I talked to you, you were dealing with A, B, and C situation in your life. How are you doing right now?"

9 times out of 10, they're doing a lot better. They'll say, "I'm doing so much better. Thank you all so much for the work that you do and the assistance that you were able to provide. Because of that, I was able to get a job and I'm on my seat again."

It's this conversation that is long‑term often, and we're thinking about populations of people that are just focusing on surviving. We're trying to talk to them about voting. It's not going to work initially, but we're planting a seed that we're going to follow up on later on in that instance when they are more stable.

Sometimes they do register to vote when we take them to DMV, sometimes they don't because they're not ready for that because that was not a conversation that they were thinking about having that day. They were just thinking about how they're going to have a roof over their head, and that's totally fine.

If we have that conversation at all at the DMV, that's another step of awareness to it. Often, it does lead to something. During these wellness calls, we'll make sure that we can plug them in to any partner organization that they might need to be plugged into to be able to obtain an essential resource.

Then at the end asked about they're making plan to vote, see if they need a ride to the polls, or if they have registered to vote or need us to check the registration or anything like that.

Maddie:  I'm just hearing the impact that VoteRiders has on the folks that y'all work with, and the prioritization of just connecting with them and what their needs are on just whatever the most basic, most important level, and being able to provide them that first.

It's not that y'all are pushing voting or civic engagement on them. You're providing them with the resources to get to a place where that seems more tangible and an option that they can begin to think about in your life.

Because like you mentioned, there's so many folks in Florida and across the country that are just thinking about surviving day to day. As easy as it is to talk about voter ID and you need to bring this document and this document and have a signature and a photo, that's not on their mind as what is very pertinent and relevant to their day‑to‑day lives.

I appreciate how you talked about that and acknowledge the ways in which the systematic oppression of folks, not only driving them from the polls or inhibiting their ability to access the polls, but you're taking an approach that is much more rooted in equity.

Offering them the foundation that they need in order to eventually be able to think and discuss those additional interests in voting or additional civic engagement and things like that.

I just wanted to highlight that. That might not be a lens. Although you're not exactly only voting related organization, but that's part of your work. Is getting people to the polls and accessing voting and IDs and things like that.

That might not be a centralized foundational view that a lot of voting and voting‑related organizations may be able to have. Just wanted to further highlight how important your work is and how appreciative we are to have you to talk about this stuff.

Jazlyn:  Thank you. It's important just to note that when we're thinking about populations of people that might be registered and aren't voting, and thinking about how we can just make sure that our communities are OK.

Especially as organizations that do voter registration, get out the vote work, thinking about how we can make sure that our communities are stable and have what they need, especially in difficult times, then checking in on them and not just showing up at their door on election day.

That being said too, on the opposite side of that coin, as I mentioned, the other 50 percent of the partners that we work with are organizations that do get out the vote work, meaning that they'll register voters, they'll sign petitions, they'll be at your door chatting with you, sending you a text saying, "Hey, you. Remember election days coming up."

With those organizations, we also obtained leads from them. Those are people that are already registered voters and just need to get their ID. They'll include a question in their script, typically seated as, "Do you have an up‑to‑date driver's license?"

Anyone that says no or doesn't fill out the field gets referred to VoteRiders. Then we help them, and the organization then follows up with them closer to election time to make sure they go vote.

In that respect, that is a very full follow‑up process. Then we have one as well as make sure that we're all following up with everyone to have the voting conversation later, and then making sure that someone gets to the polls. The reality is that we can't have that conversation until people, one, have the capacity, the mental capacity for it, and are not just focused on survival.

Maddie:  Thank you for emphasizing that. It shows that VoteRiders as an organization has a wonderful, like you said, there's this duality approach. It's like a net has been cast for all people that VoteRiders and other organization partners engage with so that in one way or another folks are brought back to you.

Whether they're in the process of they already are voting or they're experiencing hardship and that's not where they're at yet, that they're all able to come to your organization to get the resources and materials that they need.

You touched on something that's important to me personally, but also Disability Rights Florida and folks that are doing similar work. Just like this idea of making sure communities are OK, and community care, and aid, and assistance.

That leads into another question, how can our communities support each other and ensure that everybody has the information that they need to vote? How can our communities further support each other and engage with each other to continue this work?

Jazlyn:  I would say that if you are a part of any sort of community organization, whether that be you're a book club, or you run a nonprofit, or you're a community activist, or you are a small business owner, our most popular tool and resource is our ID cards.

They are wallet‑size [inaudible 35:40] cards that you can order on our website at voteriders.org/cards. You can pass those out to folks. They have, on the front, our contact information that has our helpline number, our email address, our organization name.

On the back, it has an up‑to‑date list of what you can bring with you to the poll and then our helpline information again. That's one way to tell people about VoteRiders.

Another way is just to make sure that you have a conversation about voter ID with your friends and loved ones when the topic of elections comes up or the topic of politics comes up, that you're incorporating this conversation into, or like homelessness or like jobs insecurity.

Any time you see the ability to talk about voter ID, as soon as you can, please do. Because as I mentioned, this is a process that can take anywhere from the same day that we meet someone to several months later if they don't have any documents.

We want to make sure that we are having this conversation as soon as possible all year round. That's why we [inaudible 36:35] 365 days a year because the process is super lengthy. We can definitely incorporate it that way.

As for how can we at least support each other, I definitely have learned that there is a lot of intersectionality going on in terms of our community issues, and why is what we need to work on together.

As we mentioned earlier for people with disabilities and engaging in voting and what some of the common barriers would be, whether it's ID, transportation, things like that, to come together and coalition‑build around the issues that you feel that you have in common, those ultimately are going to be reaching this common goal.

I think that it's important to highlight those intersectionalities whenever we get a chance and make sure that we're uplifting each other.

Maddie:  Definitely. Thank you, Jazlyn, so much for being here. Final wrap‑up question is, how can more people learn about y'alls' work, about this topic, and stay up to date on voter ID news and information?

Jazlyn:  Absolutely. You can find us at VoteRiders. Our handles are VoteRiders on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and you can stay up to date with us there. Our website is voteriders.org. Then the best way to learn about this topic is to be hands‑on and to volunteer. We are always taking volunteers, and we'd love to put your skills to work so please contact us.

Maddie:  Awesome. Thank you so much. It's been great talking with you, Jazlyn, and appreciate all the knowledge and information you got to share today.

Jazlyn:  Absolutely. Thank you so much, Maddie.

Keith:  Thank you, Jazlyn Gallego, for being on today's episode and for sharing so much vital information as we approach the 2022 elections this November.

Maddie:  Definitely. We hope you enjoyed the episode and were able to learn something. Join us next Thursday, October 13th, for the fourth episode of "Your Voice, Your Vote!" as we talk with researchers and election officials about voting statistics and understanding the disability vote.

Keith:  Our episodes come out each Thursday morning, so make sure to subscribe to the "You First" podcast to be alerted when those new episodes drop. We're on Apple Podcast, Spotify, YouTube, and almost anywhere you can get podcasts.

Maddie:  For more information, visit disabilityrightsflorida.org/podcast.

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