Latinojustice Relaunches Nonpartisan Cada Voto Cuenta Bilingual Voter Protection Initiative
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 30, 2020
CONTACT
Elianne Ramos, 212-739-7513, [email protected]
LATINOJUSTICE RELAUNCHES NONPARTISAN CADA VOTO CUENTA
BILINGUAL VOTER PROTECTION INITIATIVE
After conducting voter education workshops, publishing materials, and organizing volunteer training modules, civil rights organization announces initiative ahead of concluding this year’s election season
Effort will include bilingual as well as a newly revamped, volunteer-powered web app, Cada Voto Cuenta
New York, NY – LatinoJustice PRLDEF is pleased to announce the re-launch of its nonpartisan Cada Voto Cuenta bilingual voter protection initiative. First launched in 2016, the initiative strategically deploys volunteer-based voter protection efforts in Florida, Georgia, New York, and Pennsylvania, with a focus on polling locations where Spanish-speaking Latina/o voters will be exercising their right to vote.
Efforts under this initiative include voter education, know your rights workshops, in-language training modules, which have been underway as we gear up for the last stretch of this election season. For this crucial last weekend of defending the vote, LatinoJustice is punctuating its efforts with a newly revamped, volunteer-powered web app, Cada Voto Cuenta. Over 200 volunteers across the targeted geographic areas – lawyers, law students, activists, and others – have taken part in the trainings and will be on the ground during early voting and through Election Day. Each of the volunteers has participated in voter protection training focused on voting laws specific to their states as well as how to identify and report voter suppression efforts and violations.
Central to the success of this effort is LatinoJustice’s voter protection app, Cada Voto Cuenta. The new iteration of the app allows our poll monitors to report any potentially discriminatory encounters or violations of state or federal voting rights laws at polling places, in Spanish or English. The app is designed to capture voter access violations, language accessibility issues and voter intimidation or suppression activities, and other barriers to voting. Volunteers are trained to fill out a report that is immediately sent and reviewed by lawyers and election-protection experts. Poll monitors also have access to a hotline set up to report up-to-the-minute developments on the ground.
"The app’s relaunch comes at a time when voters are not only facing issues exacerbated by COVID-19 but also efforts to cause uncertainty directly aimed at Latino voters. Our gente will not be intimidated,” said Juan Cartagena, President and General Counsel at LatinoJustice. “Cada Voto Cuenta is vitally important as Spanish-language dominant voters are provided with access to a volunteer poll monitor who can speak their language during this critical election. We are incredibly fortunate to have community support in the form of volunteer poll monitors to provide election protection services to voters needing assistance."
"Cada Voto Cuenta seeks to ensure precisely that: every should vote count,” said Ricardo Negrón-Almódovar, Legal Services Coordinator at LatinoJustice. “This is why we will be focusing in areas with greater populations of Spanish-language dominant voters, to make sure that their voting rights are protected and that they are able to access the information necessary to cast a well-informed vote.”
Since 1972, LatinoJustice has focused on targeting at-large election structures, regionalization of over-populated districts, and unfair redistricting plans that attempt to dilute the power of the Latinx vote. This year’s election protection efforts cement LatinoJustice’s commitment to use litigation and advocacy to protect Latinx voting rights by challenging vote denial practices such as failure to provide bilingual assistance at polling places, discriminatory voter roll purges, and unnecessary voter challenge practices. To learn more about our Voting Rights work, please visit https://www.latinojustice.org/en/voting-rights. To learn more about Cada Voto Cuenta voter protection efforts, or to become a volunteer, visit https://bit.ly/CadaVotoCuenta
About LatinoJustice
LatinoJustice PRLDEF works to create a more just society by using and challenging the rule of law to secure transformative, equitable and accessible justice, by empowering our community and by fostering leadership through advocacy and education. For more than 40 years, LatinoJustice PRLDEF has acted as an advocate against injustices throughout New York and beyond. To learn more about LatinoJustice, visit www.latinojustice.org.