With Broken Machines and Hours-Long Waits Stopping Voters From Casting Ballots, Majority Says, "Make Election Day a Federal Holiday"

A poll released as Americans cast their ballots in the midterm elections on Tuesday shows that more than half of the country believes Election Day should be made a national holiday—a likely partial solution to a number of problems that plague the voting system.

Fifty-four percent of respondents to the survey, taken by Hill.TV and HarrisX, say workers should be given the day off on Election Day, allowing them far more time to vote, saving them from having to leave their polling places without voting due to long lines and issues with voting machines, and potentially changing the United States’ generally low election turnout for the better.

On social media, a number of politicians and political observers voiced support for the idea.

At least 12 states were reporting broken or faulty voting machines on Tuesday, including New York, Georgia, and Arizona. As a result, voters in some states were given provisional ballots—which are not always counted—while others were forced to leave polling places without voting.

Reports on social media showed that voters in New York, Florida, Indiana, and Pennsylvania were among those who had to leave due to voting machine issues.

Extremely long waits were also reported in Georgia, where the Republican candidate for governor, Brian Kemp, is also the Secretary of State and is responsible for overseeing the state’s elections. At 5:00pm on Tuesday, five Georgia voters filed an emergency lawsuit seeking to stop him from exercising any further power over the state’s elections.