Do you remember the first time you voted? I do. It was the 2004 presidential election, I was 19 years old and I was terrified. 

Inside the voting booth at my former elementary school, I worried I would accidentally cast a vote for the wrong candidate. Far worse was my fear that the lever would get stuck and I’d be trapped in the metal box forever — or at least until the polls closed. After talking to other women about their first time voting, I learned I wasn’t alone in feeling uneasy. Author and activist Blair Imani blames some of those fears on voter-suppression tactics that make it far too difficult to vote. “If you can find the love of your life by swiping right or left then you should be able to make important decisions about our country just as easy,” she says over the phone.

As Americans head to the polls — or drop off their absentee or mail-in ballots — we asked 15 women, including actresses, activists, artists and academics, to share the stories behind the first time they voted. Some of their experiences are inspiring, others are infuriating, but hopefully, each one will make voting feel less anxiety-inducing and more empowering. 

Responses have been lightly edited for length and clarity.

Ilana Glazer
Comedian best known for “Broad City” and host of the webseries “Cheat Sheet for the Voting Booth”

“The first time I voted was in the presidential election of 2008 for Barack Hussein Obama. Yas! The good ol’ days, when politicians weren’t game-show hosts. I was 21 and had been too young to vote in the 2004 presidential election, and this was before I understood how important midterm elections were — and also local, city and special elections, runoffs or whateva! I remember how human Obama felt when I was voting for him, like I was voting for this really nice, smart dad. I really couldn’t understand, until I was actually filling in my ballot and submitting it into the machine, that my vote would be counted! It was truly thrilling.”

Teresa Lopez 
Special education paraprofessional 

“The first year I got to vote was 1980, which was such a tumultuous, horrible time. My grandparents met at the Democratic Club on the Lower East Side in the 1920s, so we’re a Democratic family, but that year, not so much. Everybody had put their faith in Jimmy Carter four years earlier, but by then it was just really bad with the Iran hostage situation and the oil crisis. I drank the Kool-Aid, too. I can’t believe I’m about to say this out loud, but yes, I voted for Ronald Reagan and it has haunted me all my life. I changed it around four years later. Unfortunately, [1984 Democratic presidential nominee] Walter [Mondale] and Gerry [Ferraro, the first female vice-presidential nominee for a major party] lost, but I tried. I never, ever voted for a Republican again.”

LaTosha Brown
Co-founder of the Black Voters Matter Fund 

“I always wanted to vote and, in 1988, I got to vote for Jesse Jackson. To be able to vote for a Black man for president my first time voting was pretty outstanding. He was a Black man who came out of movement building who, even more so than Obama, spoke to Black people. He was a progressive candidate. He was a barrier breaker. I had never seen a Black man run for office. I had not seen someone who could rap as part of his platform. I think the same thing worked for me that works for young folks now: They’re looking for something different. They’re looking for somebody who is relatable and breaks out of the traditional political space. Jesse was that for me.”

Read 12 other women’s first-time voting stories here. 

ICYMI

Three need-to-know stories

01.

As the Food and Drug Administration approved the first drug to treat covid-19, Anika Chebrolu, an Indian American 14-year-old, won the 3M Young Scientist Challenge and $25,000 for her discovery of a potential antiviral treatment for the coronavirus.

02.

Early-voting counts show a record level of civic participation before Election Day. The tens of millions of ballots already cast show highly enthusiastic voters are making sure their votes are counted amid a pandemic. Track the numbers here. 

03.

The full Senate is set to vote on and confirm Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to the Supreme Court Monday, after her nomination was advanced by the Senate Judiciary Committee with solely Republican support.

Watch now

The latest from our video team

There are a lot of voting challenges to consider ahead of the 2020 elections, especially if this is your first time marking your ballot. Should you vote by mail or go to the polls? How do you know what information is trustworthy? What do you do if you don’t love the candidates? The Lily’s Maya Sugarman talked to experts to answer your top questions. Here’s how to make the best voting plan for you.

Good news

A story to make you smile

When the coronavirus pandemic left elderly residents in long-term care facilities largely cut off from the outside world in early March, 15-year-old Hita Gupta got busy. She marshaled the resources of a nonprofit she had founded in 2018 to start sending letters and care packages to senior homes nationwide, even reaching some in the United Kingdom and Canada, writes Allyson Chiu in The Washington Post. But letters and cards, while kind, are “one-sided communication,” Gupta said. The high school junior wanted to do more. Drawing inspiration from the regular Skype sessions she has with her grandparents, who live in India, Gupta started offering another service to the eldercare centers: video calls with volunteers from her nonprofit, Brighten A Day. The organization has also been collecting camera-enabled devices, such as smartphones and tablets, and donating them to facilities in need, allowing residents more chances to virtually connect. About 100 volunteers have signed up to participate in calls, Gupta said.

Until next time

But before we part, some recs

Lena Felton

Multiplatform editor, The Lily

What I’m reading:

After weeping while reading Jesmyn Ward’s beautiful essay about losing her husband to covid-19, I immediately bought her memoir, “Men We Reaped.” I’ve always loved Ward’s novels, but given everything happening in the world — namely, our country’s necessary reckoning with systemic racism — this memoir has resonated like nothing else I’ve read this year. It charts Ward’s own upbringing alongside the violent, untimely deaths of five young Black men in her life.

What I’m making a routine:

A couple of months ago, I passed a friend on the street; she was coming back from dropping off her compost at a local market. I couldn’t believe it took me three years living in Washington, D.C., to realize I should be doing that, too. So I bought a kitchen bin and green waste bags, and folded walking my compost to the market into my weekly routine. If your city is like D.C., try calling your closest farmers market or natural food store to see if they’ll take your scraps.

What I’m parenting:

When my dear co-worker Nneka left D.C. for Chicago, where she’ll be working until we go back to the office, she left me in charge of “The Bird”: her enormous, leafy bird of paradise plant. With the help of my plant-loving partner, we’ve since repotted her, given her new soil and tried to figure out where she’ll be happiest in a new home. If you have any tips for a first-time owner of a person-size plant, message me on Instagram @lenakfelton.

🖤

Thanks for reading.