Hundreds of North Carolina school college students hit the pavement on the first day of early voting. Sources say their marching lasted practically an hour to forged their ballots after officers denied on-campus polling places at two Greensboro universities.
Students from North Carolina A&T State University, the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and Bennett College joined the Oct. 15 march to Union Square Campus, turning the prolonged journey to the polls into a public demonstration over voting entry.
The march came after N.C. A&T and UNCG, which both hosted early voting places during the 2024 normal election, were denied campus websites for the 2026 election.
Students Faced A Long Walk And Hourslong Waits
According to Greensboro.com, college students at N.C. A&T and UNCG held simultaneous rallies before marching to Union Square on the first day of early voting, with Bennett College college students and others becoming a member of alongside the means.
Marchers carried indicators studying, “It’s About Us” and “They close polling sites, we keep showing up anyway,” while chanting, “This is what democracy looks like.”
Greensboro.com reports that the Guilford County Board of Elections earlier this yr declined requests from college students and native activists to add early voting websites at N.C. A&T and UNCG. The board instead accepted Union Square Campus, a downtown Greensboro well being care schooling middle and collaboration between N.C. A&T, UNCG and Guilford Technical Community College, as a compromise.
Reporters say the trek from the campuses embody gaps in the sidewalk and poison ivy alongside the route.
The journey was only half of the problem.
Greensboro.com states that native Democratic organizer Kema Leonard said some college students waited three hours to vote, while others had to go away early to return to class or get to work.
“It shouldn’t have been that hard,” Leonard said. “At one point, the staffers said they had run out of registration forms. It almost proved our point that we need our own sites. They weren’t ready.”
According to the Guilford County Board of Elections’ day by day tally, more than 300 votes were forged at Union Square that day.
Student leaders also made it clear that the inconvenience would not preserve them from taking part.
“We are here to make our voices heard,” Jade Dwyer, vice chairman of the UNC Greensboro College Democrats, informed college students before the march.
At N.C. A&T, College Democrats political affairs director Xavier Jones delivered a comparable message.
“They are betting that you are too tired, too apathetic and have no attention span … but we are here,” Jones said.
Sen. Natalie Murdock, a Greensboro native who represents Chatham and Durham counties, joined the college students for the roughly 45-to-50-minute stroll.
“I took the 45-to-50-minute walk with them, and there are no words,” Murdock said in Greensboro.com. “They were amazing. They were positive.”
Some taking part college students informed reporters that this was a first time voting.
Previous Campus Polling Sites And Elections Board Votes
TheGrio reports that N.C. A&T and UNCG both had early voting places on their respective campuses during the 2024 normal election before being denied websites for the 2026 election.
N.C. A&T, UNCG and Bennett College took to the streets by the a whole lot, with social media movies documenting the prolonged journey to and from the new polling location.
TheGrio states that the North Carolina State Board of Elections voted 3-2 alongside social gathering traces in January to deny N.C. A&T a polling website. Reports also say that the Republican-led board again denied the college a polling location in August.
N.C. A&T is the largest four-year traditionally Black school in the nation.
“Can we identify a single voter who is better served by having fewer opportunities to cast a ballot?” Jeff Carmon, one of two Democrats on the state elections board, requested during the newest listening to, cited by theGrio.
Political leaders also inspired college students to preserve their classmates engaged.
North Carolina Supreme Court candidate Anita Earls, state Sen. Gladys Robinson and state House Minority Leader Robert Reives inspired college students to deliver a pal and make positive their friends got to the polls.
“You turned out when they took your voting site away,” Reives said. “You need to do your duty today, and then you need to make sure that any student that didn’t get in their vote today, you get them there.”
Early voting in North Carolina continues through Oct. 31.
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