Radio Diary: A Georgia Early Voter Recounts Her Long Day At The Polls

Everlean Rutherford waited 10 hours on Monday to exercise her constitutional right to vote in Cobb County, Georgia.

"I quickly realized, probably an hour in, that this was going to take a long time," she says.

She arrived at her polling station at around 10 a.m. She didn't leave until 7:43 at night. But she stayed in line, determined not to let the long line stop her from casting her ballot.

"A lot of people did leave and were like, I can't take this," she recalls. "But everyone around was kind of cheering each other on, like 'Don't leave, stay, you got this.'"

"I enjoyed that part," she added of the ten hours she spent waiting with fellow Georgians. "Just socializing and being kind to people, no matter who you were voting for."

Rutherford says one of the factors motivating her to tough out the wait was the killings of George Floyd and other unarmed Black people by the police.

"I have three boys, three Black boys, young men," she says. "I can't imagine that being one of my sons. I wanted to stay there as long as I had to to make sure my vote and my voice was heard."

Rutherford says that after the long lines and frustration of voting in the 2018 midterms, she thought Georgia might take action to make the process easier two years later. She calls the fact that she ran into the same problems this year "ridiculous."

"I really have not seen any changes," she says, "so to me they want long lines. They don't want people to get out and vote. They don't want peoples' voices to be heard."

Everlean Rutherford, Georgia voter.