Late at night on Thursday, Sept. 19, 2024, the Board of Aldermen for the City of Frederick, Maryland, voted in a 4 to 1 decision to allow all those who reside in the city to vote in local elections, regardless of immigration status. This makes Frederick the largest municipality in Maryland that allows noncitizen voting.

While many groups were involved in the advocacy around this issue, it was RISE Coalition of Western Maryland that led the charge. RISE is a coalition led by an immigrant Comité (committee) who decide RISE’s advocacy priorities. The rest of RISE provides support with planning, education, and execution of the issues. CLINIC is a member of RISE’s advisory board.

A year or so ago, the Comité noticed that there were other municipalities in Maryland that allow noncitizen voting at the local level and said that they would like to see it in Frederick; they wanted all residents, including noncitizens, to be able to vote in city elections. They asked, how do we accomplish that? As a member of the advisory board, CLINIC lent expertise to be able to educate and empower immigrants on this issue. CLINIC provided educational resources to the community, including the Frederick mayor, as well as the Board of Aldermen (and Women). CLINIC put together a PowerPoint for a community education event where immigrants shared their stories and provided the legal background on noncitizen voting. State and Local Advocacy Attorney, Viviana Westbrook, wrote an opinion piece on the issue for the Frederick News Post. The community consistently showed up at different events to share their stories and show what voting in local elections means to them. Hearing stories from immigrants who are business owners, homeowners, and who have lived in the community for years, even decades, talk about wanting a say in their own community greatly impacted listeners and helped change hearts and minds in Frederick.

Although it was immigrants who really showed up during this entire push for noncitizen voting rights that started a year and a half ago, it was citizens who mainly came out to support the right to vote for their immigrant neighbors that last night. During a public comment session in advance of the vote on the issue, a Frederick resident named Maggie Greer said, “We have a chance to build a stronger community by allowing all residents the right to vote. These residents contribute to our work force, pay taxes, and send their children to local schools, and yet they have no say in policies that affect their daily lives... Allowing them to vote gives them a stake in our future and makes our community more inclusive, which in turn strengthens our social fabric.”

Jessica Douglas, who is part of the organization Moms Demand Action for Gun Violence Prevention, and who has worked with the County Executive’s team on public safety, shared her perspective, stating that the number one indicator of safe cities is community involvement. She discussed how cities across the country pay millions of dollars to try and incentivize community involvement. “Residents who are involved in their communities, who have a sense of ownership and autonomy in their communities, protect their communities and invest in their communities. Here you have this gift of hundreds of people who want to be more involved,” she said.

Alderman Derek Shackelford, who voted in favor of the charter amendment, shared about how he went down to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina to help out. He noted that work visas were given for immigrants to rebuild New Orleans. The same people who got them those visas then called immigration authorities on the workers to come and get them once the work was over. Alderman Shackelford discussed challenges that America has faced in its past and that it currently faces, and said he would never think to make it harder for someone to access the right to vote.

Alderman Ben MacShane stated, “I am very excited to support this measure tonight as another way in which we are welcoming all members of our community into our civic circle here; another way that we are loving the community that we are, and helping and encouraging this community to grow and further blossom into a place that values and includes everyone that share this great city with me and with my colleagues up here…Rights being extended to a new person does not reduce the rights of the person sitting next to them, it lifts us all up.”

While we now have to wait for the implementation of this change for the local elections in 2025, for now, let us celebrate this amazing victory for immigrants in Frederick!