I was excited to vote for the first time. The NC Supreme Court threw out my ballot | Opinion

On April 11, 2025, the North Carolina Supreme Court canceled my vote. The court ordered that the ballots of all voters who have never resided in the United States but have a connection to North Carolina through their parents be removed from the Supreme Court contest between Judge Jefferson Griffin and Justice Allison Riggs. The problem is that some of those alleged “never residents” have actually lived in North Carolina most or all of their lives. I am one of those canceled voters.

I was born and raised in Jackson County. I have never had a permanent residence anywhere else. I attended school here, graduated last year from Jackson County Early Collegeand received an Associate’s Degree from Southwestern Community College. My mother is the vice mayor of our town, Webster. I have a small, drone photography business located in Western North Carolina. It is not hard to find this information.

I was 19 on the day of last year’s election. This was my first chance to exercise my right to vote. I was excited to cast my ballot — to fulfill my responsibility as a United States citizen and help choose our elected officials. It has not turned out the way I expected.

Last fall, I was studying abroad for three and a half months in Spain. I am currently an undergraduate student in the School of International Service at American University. I applied to vote by absentee ballot. I was then, and I am now, a legal resident of North Carolina. My address has never changed.

I corresponded with the Jackson County Board of Elections to make sure that I was legally registered and to confirm the process for voting absentee. I even checked the list of absentee votes cast to make sure that my ballot was accepted. I wanted to make sure my ballot was counted.

I was shocked to learn in January that my ballot was among those being challenged. Once again, I checked with my local board of elections and was assured that everything looked okay on their end. The North Carolina State Board of Elections website indicates the following: “County boards of elections will contact voters when there are deficiencies with their absentee ballot. You should provide your phone number or email address on the request form in case the county board needs to contact you. Additionally, you can track your ballot from printed to accepted by signing up online for status notifications through BallotTrax.”

No one ever indicated to me that there was any error or deficiency in my ballot. My ballot was cast with plenty of time to fix any error.

Help this first-time voter understand how the state’s highest court can simply take away my vote months after it was cast without any opportunity to correct the record.

Maybe I am naive, but this is not how our democracy is supposed to work. Is this really how anyone wants to win a seat on the North Carolina Supreme Court, by fishing around for votes to cancel without allowing those individuals due process?

Legislators across the country are insisting that all high school students be required to take a civics class before graduation. I think that is an excellent idea. Maybe all office-seekers should be required to take one before running.

This certainly has given me a hard lesson in today’s power politics. This win-at-all-costs attitude is demoralizing to my generation. We want to believe that our institutions cannot be so easily manipulated. We want to believe in the fairness of our system. We want to believe that every vote really does count. And, Judge Griffin, I want my vote counted.

This story was originally published April 23, 2025 at 5:00 AM.