NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) – Louisiana’s new Secretary of State Nancy Landry says her office is fully prepared for the upcoming presidential election, scheduled for November 5.
Speaking at media outlets on Tuesday (Oct. 8), Landry emphasized the importance of voter participation and assured the public that her office is working closely with local election officials to finalize preparations.
“We’re ready, we’re ready to go now. We’re traveling the state right now doing a listening tour and meeting with our local election partners, our registrars of voters, our clerks of court just to see if they have any last-minute,” she said.
The deadline for online voter registration is October 15. In-person registration ended Monday and all other registration must be done online.
Voting rights advocates like Rosalind Blanco Cook, President of the League of Women Voters of New Orleans, are urging residents to exercise their right to vote.
“Exercise your right to vote. It’s very important. Don’t just stay home,” said Cook.
Landry, who became secretary of state in January, says under Louisiana law early voting has been expanded.
“One change that we had in the law, but this was a couple of years ago but it takes effect now. We have additional early voting days for presidential elections, so we will have 10 days of early voting for the presidential election. It starts October 18 and runs through October 29th but not on Sundays,” she said.
Over 300,000 people have been removed from Louisiana’s active voter list.
“The number that’s on the inactive rolls right now is 318,000 and that’s a figure that is a rolling number because of our annual maintenance that we do,” said Landry.
The state does a canvass of registered voters annually.
“We follow the federal law that allows us to move people who we can’t verify, we can’t verify their address, they’re moved to the inactive voter rolls and then if they come in to vote we can verify their address. They’re moved right back to the active rolls,” and Landry.
She said once their names are returned to the rolls they can vote.
Residents can check their voter status and access a sample ballot using the Geaux Vote app, which provides a range of election-related information.
Cook, who has also worked at the polls, says election fraud is rare.
“It’s almost non-existent and it’s not a prevalent problem and it’s not a situation that people should worry about that: my vote, although I’m voting but they have all these people that shouldn’t be voting that are voting, it’s just not true,” she said.
It is already illegal for non-citizens to vote but recently Gov. Jeff Landry signed a related executive order and Nancy Landry was present for the signing.
“What we did with the executive order is we got access to some data from state agencies like OMV that can tell us more information about who may be in Louisiana and have a Louisiana driver’s license but is not a citizen and allows us to check that,” she said.
What they have found so far is not a significant number.
“We’re working to check to see if any of those people are registered to vote but we did identify 48 that were registered, that were removed in the past from not being the citizen,“ Landry stated.
Still, during election season there is misinformation, and voters are urged to be careful.
“We encourage all voters to only get their information from trusted sources and that would be the secretary of state’s office, the registrar of voters, or the clerk of court,” said Landry.
Cook agrees.
“Do your research as much as possible. Try to look at reliable sources. Of course, you know, we all use Facebook and all the other social media but realize that might not be true all the time,” she said.
Landry stresses that the state’s voting machines are secure.
“Our voting machines are never, ever connected to the internet despite what you may hear from rumors circulating. Our elections are very safe and secure,” she said.
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