Election officials at a South Carolina polling station reportedly told one voter he couldn’t cast his ballot because he was wearing a Trump shirt, so the old man stripped down to get the job done.
Todd Price was at the Murrells Inlet/Garden City Fire Department on Tuesday when he snapped a picture of the unidentified man putting his shirt back on and posted the image to Facebook.
“Vote Nekkid! Good turn out at Murrells Inlet Fire Department precinct – but they made this poor guy take off his Trump shirt to vote,” Price wrote. “I thought it was ok as long as the shirt wasn’t for someone on the ballot?”
State election officials confirmed that’s the case, though Horry County Voter Registration and Elections Director Sandy Martin argues otherwise.
“It is considered campaign material whether it is relevant to the election or not,” Martin told WMBF.
Chris Whitmire, spokesman for the South Carolina Elections Commission, wrote in an email to the news site that the law bans campaign material within 200 feet of a polling place, and it applies to any kind of written or visual material that endorses or opposes any candidate, party of ballot question in the current election, he said.
“The shirt in questions does not relate to a candidate in a current election,” Whitmire said.
“It’s an understandable mistake. Poll managers are volunteers that are working hard out there, trying to do the right thing,” he told CNN. “If you closely read the handbook on campaign material, that didn’t violate the definition of material.”
Price told the site he was behind the elderly man in line to vote, and the guy was determined to cast his ballot with or without his shirt.
“When this gentleman got up to the poll worker, they told him he couldn’t come in with his shirt on, so he just took it off, tossed it down on the ground there and voted shirtless and then came out and put it back on,” he said.
The determined voter wasn’t the only one targeted for wearing Trump gear to the polls on Tuesday.
Bakersfield, California’s WBAK reports:
A man was reportedly kicked out of his polling place Tuesday for wearing President Donald Trump apparel.
Kern County Elections officials commented on the matter, saying that it is against the law to wear a candidate’s gear into the polling place.
They also said since Trump has announced he would be running for office again in 2020, he counts as a candidate even if he is not on this year’s ballot.
The California Trump supporter told the news station he was wearing a MAGA hat and Trump shirt when he was turned away.
Another voter in New York also claimed a polling clerk attempted to prevent him from casting his vote Tuesday because he was wearing a red MAGA hat, but he decided to call the clerk’s bluff.
MJ Munson said the poll worker threatened to call the police if he did not remove his hat, so he went next door to the police station himself to settle the dispute. Minutes later, he returned with a police officer who promptly set the poll worker straight, the Express reports.
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