Voters cast their ballots in the Arcata Community Center on Nov. 5, 2024. Photo courtesy of Mark Larson.
With early voting beginning next week in California’s special election on redistricting, we’re thrilled to offer our latest Reporter’s Field Guide to help journalists understand their rights to observe voting, vote counting and everything in between.
While press coverage is central to the transparency necessary in free and fair elections, many reporters are uncertain about where they’re allowed to go, how they’re allowed to interface with voters and election officials, and where and what they can photograph to document democracy in action. This guide is designed to answer those questions, and to give reporters in California an overview of the rights of other elections observers and the limitations placed on the public around polling locations, elections officers and ballot drop-boxes.
In my two decades as a reporter and editor in Humboldt County, I covered dozens of local elections. This guide is based on that foundation of first-hand experience, and scaffolded by input from the FAC team of lawyers and advocates and feedback from working journalists, nonpartisan advocacy groups and election experts.
It offers a detailed breakdown of relevant state law and regulations governing access to polling locations and vote counting centers, as well as reporting tips aimed to help reporters document one of the hallmarks of American democracy.
If you’re a working journalist and would like an introduction to the Reporter’s Field Guide: Election Day Access, join us at 1 p.m. on Oct. 28 for a Zoom meeting at which we will give a brief overview of the guide, discuss how we put it together and answer questions. To register, click here.
And anyone interested in scheduling a training on the guide, as well as past Reporter’s Field Guides on covering immigration enforcement and policing shootings or state transparency law, can find more information here.