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Voting Check-In: Primary Election Going Smoothly, Slowly

Hannah Meisel/WUIS

  The polls in Illinois are open until 7 o'clock on Tuesday. Just a fraction of registered voters have bothered showing up at recent primary elections.

Terry Shryrock is directing traffic inside the Knights of Columbus hall on the west side of Springfield. He's spent the past 10 years as an election judge.

"It's fun to watch all the people come in and vote, especially when they bring in their little kids," he said. "It's very interesting."

But fewer than one out of every four registered voters in Illinois has pulled a ballot in the last two primaries. Voter Faye Garvue is among the select this year. She says people who fail to vote are not doing their part.

"I think it's sad," she said "They're passing up an obligation as a citizen."

Officials report today's primary election is going smoothly ... for the most part.

Sangamon County Clerk Joe Aiello says his office responded to a few calls of electioneering Tuesday morning.

He says it's against the law to pass out literature or talk about candidates within a hundred feet of a polling place.

"Typically in these types of elections when you have primary battles between candidates, we have electioneering," he said. "That's an ongoing issue with each and every election."

Hannah covers state government and politics for Capitol News Illinois. She's been dedicated to the statehouse beat since interning at NPR Illinois in 2014, with subsequent stops at WILL-AM/FM, Law360, Capitol Fax and The Daily Line before returning to NPR Illinois in 2020 and moving to CNI in 2023.
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