Tama Solanoa
18:18 - 19:12
“A lot of people don't realize that I am not allowed to vote, and even some of my colleagues and friends, when they hear that I don't have a right to vote in this day and age, they are taken aback in a sense that they don't understand why I can't vote.”
- Speaker
- Tama Solanoa
- Timestamp
- 18:18 – 19:12
- Community
- Alaska News
- Location
- Alaska
From the transcript
As an American Samoan woman, it has been really hard, especially seeing our people being carted off and going through the ASD system and the UA system. A lot of people don't realize that I am not allowed to vote, and even some of my colleagues and friends, when they hear that I don't have a right to vote in this day and age, they are taken aback in a sense that they don't understand why I can't vote. So I have to go through a whole history lesson of why I am not allowed to vote and why I'm a U.S. national, and I have to go through the proper channels of getting naturalization. So that is something that growing up I wasn't informed of, not through elementary, middle, or high school. It wasn't until I was in college that I was able to do my own independent research and find this out myself so that way I could be sure of what I can and can't do as a U.S. national.
Related Coverage
A one-word change to Alaska's voting law could foreclose a path for American Samoan residents
Measure 3 would add "only" to Alaska's voter law — a narrow safeguard, its sponsor says. Opponents note noncitizen voting is already illegal and say it would foreclose a path for American Samoan residents, U.S. nationals who aren't automatically citizens.
