UPDATE:

Jack Turner AKA @baratunde has been tracking down the Benedict College sitch. Here’s what’s up.

SC law says that you must have one of the following items to vote on Election Day:

Voter Registration Card

Driver’s License

DMV-issued ID Card

This is silly since in all my years of voting at college, in MD, DC and CA, no one has ever asked for more than my name. But South Carolinians, now you know — if you want to vote, betta bring gubment ID, just in case you get some hassle. Student IDs won’t cut it.

Also, on Twitter, we’ve found an eyewitness who was on the scene (area resident/non-student). Here are some of Stacy Smallwood’s AKA @stacysmallwood tweets from Benedict College starting around 2pm EST (going most recent to oldest):

long lines are being reported at precincts down in the Lowcountry…

@baratunde i called a friend who’s going to contact the SCDP about possibly getting some legal counsel over there

@baratunde i just went to the polling station over there. was quiet while i was there, but someone described the AM as “chaos.”

@baratunde I’m not a BC student, so I don’t know what kind of education/communication campaigns they may have had re: ID requirements…

I’m at Benedict College. GOP pollwatchers are challenging students whose names are on roll but don’t have voter reg cards.

If you live in SC, please share any info you have about what’s going on in the Low Country, in Sumter and at Benedict College…many thanks.

—–

I just got a phone call early my time (7:40am PST) that there are Tea Partiers that are trying to prevent black people from voting. This is how racism works and why it’s so important that we fight back. If our right to vote wasn’t so powerful, there wouldn’t be folks working so hard to thwart it. I don’t have any more information than what I’ve been told below.

In Columbia South Carolina, I’m hearing that there are Tea Party folks at Benedict College. There’s a precinct there. They are protesting student votes and making them vote with provisional ballots. Please go down to this polling place if you are nearby or call the police if you are a resident. Benedict is one of our proudest HBCUs and these kids don’t deserve this as one of their first experiences voting in America. I’m hearing that they were turning students away who tried to use their student id as identification. The students were being referred to the County voter registration office. Which is ridiculous — most student IDs are photo IDs and should be enough to establish you are who you say you are so you can vote. Look — to prevent this kind of stupidity: please make sure you take a gov’t issued id — driver’s license, passport, etc — to the polls with you today.

In another report, the Tea Party is on the move at the North Hope Center precinct which is also known as Morris Brown at Sumter SC. These bigots are shouting at the hard working people who have taken time from work or school and are telling them not to vote. Apparently this is happening at more than one location in Sumter.

I’m waiting for photos and videos but again — if you live in SC, please help out by being a witness on the scene or asking a friend or family to help. Add your photos, testimony, video or just plain outrage in the comments.

These people make me sick. If you are seeing voter intimidation or suppression elsewhere, please tell us in the comments, call 1-866-OUR VOTE or use Twitter to help report problems. If there’s violence afoot, call the cops.

THANK YOU. And hang in there. Steal back your vote, my peeps.