Why do you think Elections need to be free and fair
Answers
Answer:
The most fundamental principle defining credible elections is that they must reflect the free expression of the will of the people. To achieve this, elections should be transparent, inclusive, and accountable, and there must be equitable opportunities to compete in the elections
Answer:
With the outbreak of Covid-19, much of the nation’s infrastructure is being tested as never before, including its electoral institutions.The current framing of the debate does not help and may ultimately prevent us from solving the problem. During an emergency, both officials and the public may be inclined to search for a single, clear policy fix. Yet the search is illusory. The choice that elected officials face in an emergency is not whether to delay or proceed with an election. Nor is it merely whether to universalize voting by mail. Rather, both measures are potential means to two equally important ends that sit in tension with one another: protecting public health and preserving free and fair elections. Delays may help to mitigate immediate health risks, but they may also create new barriers to access.
Preserving free and fair elections in an emergency requires officials to treat elections like the critical infrastructure they are. Through their emergency powers, governors, election officials, and public-health leaders will play an especially important role in setting the tone and coordinating operations here. Borrowing from the standard three-part public-health framework, they must first assess the barriers to voting during an emergency, then use evidence to adopt a variety of policies that will minimize those barriers, and finally engage in assurance, ensuring that all necessary means are available to hold the election. Indeed, the guidelines for emergency management of elections developed by the National Association of Secretaries of State and the US Election Assistance Commission recommend that states pursue a variety of options to preserve ballot access while protecting public health. We can also take lessons from the way elections were managed following Hurricane Sandy in 2012. In New Jersey, the state pursued a comprehensive approach to emergency election management, which included daily statewide calls in the week leading up to Election Day, as well as a strategy for minimizing barriers to the ballot box and expanding early in-person, mobile, and provisional voting.
This example points to the most important challenge states will face in the days and weeks ahead. The infrastructure of US election administration is already highly uneven, poorly funded, and administratively burdensome for voters. A combination of red tape and inadequate resources all work to depress turnout under the best of circumstances. And, as the Iowa Caucuses showed, when public officials fail to plan system redundancies, the likelihood of significant errors increases. As we ask state and local officials to use invoke emergency authority to protect their residents’ public health and their economic survival, we must also demand that Congress recognize the risks to democratic rule. As the Brennan Center for Justice notes, this will require both appropriating needed resources to support expanded emergency election operations as well as re-considering Electoral College deadlines. Yet regardless of the specific mix of actions taken by any level of government, officials must apply a crisis management lens to the protection of free and fair elections. The right to vote is as precious a resource as any we have—and just as vulnerable.
Explanation: