What Voting Means To Me

Spencer Mestel is an independent journalist and poll worker based in Brooklyn New York who shares his appreciation for the wonderful and yes, “forgettable” voting experiences he has had, his hopes for a less burdensome system of voting in the United States, and how elite partisan rhetoric and a lack of public understanding of how elections are run have combined to become a potent threat to American democracy.

Spencer has written for the New York Times, The Guardian, Vice, The Intercept, and more. He also has a newsletter called Spenser’s Super Tuesday you can subscribe to, and you can give him a follow on Twitter @spensermestel.

"You can mess around with me, but don't mess around with my voters." Tune in to this special Election Day episode to hear about the magical work Genya Coulter has done as a poll worker in the state of Florida during the 2020 election cycle.

In this episode, Monique Newton shares how she came to understand the significance of local politics growing up in Sacramento, California. Now a Ph.D. student specializing in urban politics, Monique crafts a compelling narrative from her formative experiences to her burgeoning research agenda and work as an educator. Monique and Mara talk about the tensions that can exist between descriptive representation and substantive representation, and Monique graciously offers words of wisdom for all of the students, teachers, and professors who are grappling with how to discuss police violence against Black bodies and challenge white supremacy culture. Ultimately, Monique shares her deep appreciation of the right to vote—a right that was so fiercely contested and fought for—but also recognizes it is only one step in bending the arc of the moral universe towards a more just and equitable world.

In this episode, Mara talks to Dr. Holly Garnett, a professor of political science at the Royal Military College of Canada, about growing up in the world of Canadian politics. Holly shares how she went from working directly in Canadian Party politics, to engaging in the behind the scenes work of understanding and improving the function of electoral systems as a professor. She offers insight as to the central challenges facing elections in the United States in the lead up to the 2020 election, and Holly and Mara muse over the calculus of voting.

A look at what's ahead in Season 2 of "What Voting Means to Me."

In this episode we hear from Jason Amos, a gifted violist, who tells us a beautifully complex story of how his own musicianship, upbringing, and living as a black gay man in America has shaped his perception of what it means to engage in a democracy. Jason and Mara discuss how the act of making music in collaboration with others can be deeply reflective of what it feels like to engage in deliberative democracy. They muse over whether Barack Obama is a better viola player than Jason, and bond over their shared love of Mara’s Congressional Representative in Connecticut, Jahana Hayes, and Jason's in Massachusetts, Ayanna Pressley. Jason talks about how, despite growing up in a middle-class black neighborhood, he still felt the sting of racism as a child, being constantly on alert for how his presence made white community members feel. Jason opens up about the existential dread he feels every time he is pulled over by the police, and the generational trauma his family experiences today as a result of police brutality. Jason expresses worry that too many people are voting out of fear, willful ignorance, and greed. As for himself, he ultimately sees his vote as an act of great hope, and looks to cast ballots for those he feels will deliver more just and equitable outcomes for American democracy.

With Jason’s permission, and in solidarity with and recognition of the protests happening all around the world in response to the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and far too many others, there are 8 minutes and 46 seconds of silence before the interview with Jason begins. This is the amount of time it took to end George Floyd’s life. Mara encourages you to sit in this silence, notice what you feel, sit with any discomfort, and breath deeply into it before journeying into Jason’s story.

Dr. Brian Harrison is a political scientist specializing in American politics and public opinion. He most recently published “A Change is Gonna Come: How to Have Productive Political Conversations in a Divided America.” Brian sat down with Mara to talk about how his experiences growing up in Iowa, his time in the second Bush administration as a political appointee in the Department of Homeland Security, and his career as a political scientist have shaped his understanding of American democracy. He tells us what it was like growing up with the presidential candidate pizazz of Iowa politics, and recalls a fateful encounter with Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley that left a lasting impression.

Brian and Mara discover they had a shared penchant for dressing up as Republican presidents for Halloween growing up, and they dig deep into the nature of political disagreement in American politics. Brian cautions that—while we should not expect everyone to “come together” in a kumbaya moment of unity—deliberative democracy requires that, at times, we find ways to have meaningful conversations with those who disagree with us. Inspired by the authenticity of elected officials like Harvey Milk, Brian still sees each and every vote—no matter the election, big or small—as an opportunity.

In this episode we hear from a remarkably complex and fascinating voter who also happens to be an avowed atheist. Mark Stickney is an HVAC / plumbing sales engineer, musician, and actor from Chicago, Illinois. He tells us his story about growing up in a conservative southern town and his transition from this socialization to his now active role in progressive politics. Triggered at a young age to “question everything,” as he puts it, Mark explains how his journey to progressive politics and voting is inextricably tied with his embrace of atheism. While he began his time as an active voter feeling more or less apathetic during the 2004 elections, his passion for learning and epistemology brought him to the political activism he engages in today. He and I muse about the impossibility of religious freedom, and Mark clarifies that being an atheist does not mean one hates religion. We argue for the imperative of self-reflection in today’s politics, and Mark shares how his vote is tied back to how it might impact others. “Voting for me,” he shares, “means doing my part to make life better for somebody else… it’s about the active effort of thinking of others and putting them above myself.” Ultimately, Mark hopes that his activism—and vote—will leave the world a better place for his children and all who will come after them.

After months of contentious primaries, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominating process came to a close in Philadelphia. Nominating the first female candidate for president of a major political party, the Democratic establishment sought to facilitate unity amidst the enmity that had been simmering between Hillary Clinton’s supporters and progressive allies of Independent-turned Democrat Bernie Sanders, a senator from Vermont.

In the middle of this thicket was Pia Deshpande, a then 17-year-old, now graduating senior at Columbia University, who made an impressive run to become a delegate to the Democratic National Convention that summer. In this episode, Pia walks us through the path that lead her to that point, and all that has come for her since: enrollment at the University of Texas and then a transfer to Columbia University as a political science major, an abiding curiosity of the American political system, and a participation in that system as a regular voter. Pia shares the experience and impact of her first vote—on November 8, 2016—and the aftermath of that election on the campus at the University of Texas. As the daughter of parents who immigrated to the United States from India, she also talks about the different paths her parents took with their own engagement in the political system, paths that were shaped, in part, by her father’s survival in one of the buildings hit during the September 11th attacks, as well as subsequent threats she and her family felt as Hindu Indians living in the United States. Ultimately, Pia is a passionate voter who wants others to engage in politics, but recognizes the barriers to participation that many people face. Having experienced first-hand high costs in the process of voting absentee in particular, Pia recognizes how, even today, the vote is not something that is self-evident or a given for so many in the United States.

In this episode we reflect on the interconnectedness between faith and politics, taking a spiritual journey as we hear from to Gabriela De Golia, a pastor in training Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York. Growing up in a politically active neighborhood in San Francisco, Gabriela takes us from her time as a resident in this progressive community, to her early teenage years in France, and her political and spiritual activism during and beyond her college years. For Gabriela, political participation has always been a part of the fabric of her life, raised to be engaged in politics from a young age. But as she grew older and broadened her horizons, she realized that, while she deeply values the act of voting, not everyone has been afforded the same kind of access and efficacy from this act that she has.

Ultimately, for Gabriela, the vote ties back to her relationship with her communities and a belief that she exists in systems where there are larger forces at work than herself alone.  She reflects on how the inescapable connections between communities and individuals has become painfully apparent in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. Offering ministerial comfort and guidance, Gabriela gently challenges listeners to recognize the ways in which this crisis is revealing how deeply interconnected we are, and how we might support that interconnectedness through our political efforts, voting and otherwise. She offers hope for the possibility of rebirth and reconnection—politically, economically, and spiritually—as we emerge from this pandemic.