Sunday, November 01, 2020

American yet cannot vote for the president

 Four million US citizens are deprived of having a vote on who will be America's president. They are the residents of America's colonies. 

An example is the island of Guam. They vote for a local legislature, a governor, and a delegate to the US House of Representatives – a delegate who cannot vote – but their choice for president, marked on the same ballot, carries no weight. It is a straw poll: a non-binding four-yearly exercise that serves merely as a barometer on who Guamanians would wish to be in the White House.  It is of symbolic value.

An American citizen living abroad is eligible to vote by absentee ballot unless he or she chooses to live in one of the sixteen US Territories such as Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana Islands, and US Virgin Islands.

As well as not being able to vote for the president  their representatives to the US Congress do not have a voting power. The islands' representative can introduce bills and push for the territory’s agenda at the congressional committee level, but has no vote on the floor.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/31/the-us-election-that-doesnt-count-guam-goes-to-the-polls-but-votes-wont-matter

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