Simone Alisa arrived at her polling place in Atlanta’s Old Fourth Ward at 9.45am on Tuesday. Five hours later, she would cast her vote.
Georgia’s primary election, which the Atlanta Journal-Constitution called a “complete meltdown” due to the long lines, faulty voting machines and understaffed polling stations, left much of the state stupefied. For Alisa, a 66-year-old interior designer, it was a wake-up call.
On Tuesday, as the minutes of waiting turned into hours, the line she waited in took shape. Volunteers handed out bottles of water, burritos and Chick-fil-A sandwiches to visibly grateful and perspiring voters. Others came prepared, bringing with them umbrellas, lawn chairs and in some cases, laptops on which to work as the line crawled forward.
For her part, Alisa arrived with a camouflage face mask and a handwritten list of candidates she was voting for, among them Fani Willis for county district attorney and the Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden. She expected a 30-minute wait, she said, like all the other times she had voted there. As the line inched forward, Alisa befriended a group of voters behind her, all millennials. “These are my people,” she said with a laugh, adding that they had held her place in line when she left for much-needed breaks.