Highway to the Election-Zone (ft. Marcia Johnson-Blanco + Surprise Guest)

In this edition of the Panda Pod, guest host Erin Haire joins us as we sit down with Marcia Johnson-Blanco. Then we are revisited by a friend of the pod. Learn more about The Election Protection Hotline by calling 866-Our-Vote or visiting www.866ourvote.org. Learn more about the ASL Voter Hotline by calling 301-818-VOTE or visiting www.nad.org/voter-information/   Transcript: Michelle Bishop: Hi everyone. Welcome to episode two of the new, the improved, The Panda Pod, your one and only podcast for the P&A network. This is Michelle Bishop, one third of your hosting team. Stephanie Flynt: And I’m Stephanie Flynt, one of the two thirds of your hosting team coming from my closet. Michelle Bishop: I don’t know if you had to tell people that, but yes. And just as shorter, unfortunately, our third host is on a little bit of a hiatus, but we have a very special guest hosting with us today. Erin, tell the people who you are. Erin Haire: Hi everyone. I’m Erin Haire. Happy to be the third hostess with the mostest. I am the voting rights specialist here at NDRN and happy to chat about all things voting with you guys. Michelle Bishop: Does it sound like the voting team at NDRN is taking over this podcast? Erin Haire: That’s the way it should be. Michelle Bishop: I agree. Stephanie Flynt: No one voted on that. Michelle Bishop: Oh, sick voting burn. I respect it, Stephanie. Stephanie Flynt: But I burnt myself too, so it’s okay. Michelle Bishop: Well, actually this episode is going to be all about voting because today is November 1st, which means that if you have not voted yet, you have one week left to get the job done. Midterm elections are coming up on November 8th, so we are going to be talking all things voting on this episode. We have a special guest today who’s going to be talking to us all about the Election Protection Coalition and options for voters who have difficulty voting on election day. We’re going to have a really cool spotlight story from a very special top secret guest who used to be a poll worker. And before we can get to all that, let’s talk about P&As in the news. What are the hot topics going on lately? Jack Rosen: Okay. And I’ll pull that up. And in the meanwhile, Michelle, do I just not get an intro anymore? Michelle Bishop: Do we intro? Wait, can we vote on this? Who thinks we should intro Jack, our producer? Stephanie Flynt: Aye…oh wow I’m all alone. Michelle Bishop: Did we not vote on that? This is little awkward. Erin Haire: I’m affirmative. Stephanie Flynt: Okay, good. Exercise your right to vote, ya’ll. That’s like the whole – Michelle Bishop: Jack Rosen with our communications team, our digital communications specialist, Senior Digital… Jack, what is your title? I can’t introduce you. Jack Rosen: Senior Digital Communications Specialist. Michelle Bishop: I was very close. In my defense, I was very close. Stephanie Flynt: I was like, this is so suspenseful. Michelle Bishop: Wait, I’m sorry. Stephanie, do you not have major news for us right now? Stephanie Flynt: Yes, you could call it major news. I’m going to start over. Michelle Bishop: A little bill that maybe got signed into law recently. I’m just saying. Stephanie Flynt: Well, after working on this legislation for some time now, I’m super excited to announce that the PAVA Inclusion Act is now the law of the land. Now, for those of you who may not be familiar with the PAVA Inclusion Act, essentially what happened was the Northern Marina Islands and the Native American Consortium we’r