Election Day: Get to the Polls

Article By: David Becker Read time:
Projects: Election Initiatives
Election Day: Get to the Polls

Today is Election Day in many jurisdictions across the country, and as it has since 2008, Pew’s Voting Information Project (VIP) will be ensuring that voters have easy access to basic election information—such as polling place locations and ballot content—via the tools they use most, including mobile apps and search engines. Thanks to our partners, including Google and Facebook, voters will be able to use these resources to make their voting experience easier and more efficient.

For instance, our annual Get to the Polls project—powered by the Google Civic Information application programming interface, in partnership with The Internet Association—enables voters to use their home addresses to find their official polling places, get hours of operation, and review their ballot for all supported statewide and municipal elections.

VIP’s white-label Voting Information Tool and its iOS and Android apps are available again for 2015 and provide  polling place hours and locations, contact information for local election officials, and registration website links in English, Spanish, Chinese, Hindi, Japanese, Khmer, Korean, Tagalog, Thai, and Vietnamese.

And VIP’s texting tool offers yet another avenue for accessing this vital information. Users can text “VOTE”—or, for Spanish speakers, “VOTO”—to GOVOTE (468683) to receive voting information via SMS in the same 10 languages.* The tool is available to interested organizations at no charge.

We will continue and expand this work in 2016. VIP and its partners will be providing information on more primary elections than ever before, in addition to covering the November 2016 presidential election.

Stay tuned for more news about next year; and in the meantime, check out VotingInfoProject.org for more information.

*By sending a text message to Pew, you consent to receive voting information via texts from an automated system. This is a free service, but standard text message rates may apply. You may revoke consent by contacting Pew, including by texting STOP.

David Becker directs election initiatives for The Pew Charitable Trusts.

America’s Overdose Crisis
America’s Overdose Crisis

America’s Overdose Crisis

Sign up for our five-email course explaining the overdose crisis in America, the state of treatment access, and ways to improve care

Sign up
Quick View
America’s Overdose Crisis

America’s Overdose Crisis

Sign up for our five-email course explaining the overdose crisis in America, the state of treatment access, and ways to improve care

Sign up
Voter Turnout
Voter Turnout
Article March 1, 2016

Election Dispatches

Election administration by the numbers
Quick View
Voter Turnout
Article March 1, 2016

Election Data Dispatches provides data, research and analysis about election administration in the U.S. While we link to external research data and other materials, we neither independently verify them, endorse the reports, nor affirm the authors' opinions.

RELATED
Tags
Election administration
Projects
Election Initiatives
Places
United States

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

A presentation being given by a businesswoman to a group of participants at a business conference.

Fact Sheet

April 12, 2024 Four Plan Features Can Boost 'Retirement Readiness'
An illustration of a couple holding hands walking away from an outline of houses behind them

Podcast

March 22, 2024 Pathways to Homeownership: Housing in America
A landscape with mountains and clouds. BLM Rule Puts Conservation, Other Land Uses on Equal Footing

MORE FROM PEW

About a dozen people stand examining large blue bins full of whole fish in a warehouse. Some people are in green clothes, others in blue, and all wear ballcaps. A few hold clipboards. Reducing Risk Strengthens the Seafood Supply Chain
A worker in a seafood market dumps bright orange shrimp from a blue bin onto a bed of ice between a lot of other seafood laid out for sale. Other workers are visible in the background, as are the arms of shoppers placing orders from the other side of the ice bed. Seafood Industry Benefits From Greater Vessel Transparency
An aerial view of a vast wetland, with scattered vegetation visible on sandy islands. In Western Australia, a Conservation Model for the World
A presentation being given by a businesswoman to a group of participants at a business conference. Four Plan Features Can Boost 'Retirement Readiness'
Composite image of modern city network communication concept

Learn the Basics of Broadband from Our Limited Series

Sign up for our four-week email course on Broadband Basics
Quick View

How does broadband internet reach our homes, phones, and tablets? What kind of infrastructure connects us all together? What are the major barriers to broadband access for American communities?

Pills illustration
Pills illustration

What Is Antibiotic Resistance—and How Can We Fight It?

Sign up for our four-week email series The Race Against Resistance.
Quick View
Pills illustration

Antibiotic-resistant bacteria, also known as “superbugs,” are a major threat to modern medicine. But how does resistance work, and what can we do to slow the spread? Read personal stories, expert accounts, and more for the answers to those questions in our four-week email series: Slowing Superbugs.