Real-life experiences can affect positive change.
Terre Haute native Kristin Fleschner is working to change Indiana’s restrictive voting system on behalf of the state’s blind residents. Fleschner is one of thousands of blind or low-vision Hoosiers. She and others are plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging Indiana voting law. The sight-impaired voters rightly argue that they should be afforded a private, independent method of voting — a protection already extended to other voters.
Blind voters could easily vote independently and confidentially at home with electronic tools, their lawsuit claims.
Instead, their options for casting a ballot were less private and unnecessarily risky, given the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the suit adds.
Fleschner brings a unique perspective to the situation. The 38-year-old had voted both in-person and absentee in her home state before she lost her sight. She also is an organ transplant recipient, leaving her more vulnerable to complications if she contracted the virus. And, Fleschner understands the law. She is a Harvard Law School graduate, formerly worked for the U.S. Department of State, and volunteered as an attorney to work on voter protection issues during the 2020 election.
As a blind Hoosier voter in this year’s election, Fleschner sought an absentee ballot, hoping to limit her virus exposure.
That is when Fleschner learned she could only vote absentee by having a two-member traveling board visit her home, which she chose to do, rather than voting at a polling site in person. The situation required Fleschner’s mother to mark her ballot for her.
Her confidentiality and health safety did not have to be so compromised. “Because Ms. Fleschner is a daily user of assistive technology that allows her to independently accomplish a wide variety of tasks, she would have been able to fill out an electronic ballot independently and privately had such a ballot been available,” the lawsuit contends.
Federal law already requires states to email ballots to military and overseas voters. “It is disheartening to know that there are ways I could vote privately and independently from outside the United States, but do not have that option when I live in Indiana,” Fleschner told the Tribune-Star.
Other vision-impaired Hoosiers also detailed their voting difficulties in the lawsuit. One plaintiff says she applied to vote absentee but was prevented from doing so because no traveling board was available in her county.
The suit alleges state’s Absentee Vote from Home Program is discriminatory under the Americans with Disabilities Act by failing to provide equal opportunities for blind and low-vision voters. The suit seeks only injunctive relief, not monetary damages. The complaint was filed against the Indiana Election Commission and the Indiana Secretary of State. A spokeswoman for Indiana Secretary of State Connie Lawson declined comment Friday.
Indiana legislative leaders have staunchly resisted easing any of its voting restrictions. So, it is unlikely that a much-needed comprehensive reform of those laws will happen in the near future. Nonetheless, the pandemic has illuminated particularly unfair elements of Hoosier election policies. The limitations faced by blind and low-vision voters in casting their ballots independently and confidentially need addressed. Kristin Fleschner and others in that situation deserve changes.
Fleschner wrote on her online blog, “Indiana can do better, and it has to, because it’s the law.”
Send comments to [email protected].
