The sudden uprising of the national pandemic that is the coronavirus is impacting many upcoming national, state, and local elections. 

The President of the United States is urging for Americans to socially distance themselves from others for at least 15 days, hoping to minimize the spread of the COVID-19 illness. In these 15 days however, there will be multiple presidential primaries hosted in different states that could majorly impact the result of the 2020 presidential election. A decrease in voters during these important primaries could potentially result in a different nomination for the democratic candidate.

On a state level, the lack of cleaning supplies in polling places, moving polling places out of nursing homes, and ensuring there are enough poll workers are all major virus-related hurdles that states will have to overcome. States including Connecticut. Indiana, and Ohio have decided to postpone their 2020 primaries due to the coronavirus threat, which has significantly altered the daily lives of Americans. 

Even municipal elections could be postponed due to COVID-19. In Texas, Governor Greg Aboott issued a proclamation that will allow municipalities to postpone their upcoming May 2nd elections until November. Individual municipalities will still have to act to postpone their elections, but Abbott urged officials to move them to November; ” I strongly encourage local election officials to take advantage of these waivers and postpone their elections until November,” Abott said in a statement. 

No matter the size or importance of these elections, we must take major precautions against this virus in order to protect our country from total destruction. The government is still unsure of how long this pandemic will last, and the lack of federal mandates at the moment mean that the impact will vary from state to state.