While in Elizabethton as a part of a statewide tour of local election offices, Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett made an impromptu stop at Happy Valley Elementary School Thursday morning after he met with local election officials.
Hargett was joined on his trip by Tennessee Coordinator of Elections Mark Goins. Together, the two officials are visiting several different county election offices all across the state during early voting.
“We’re really trying to emphasize the convenience of early voting,” Hargett said. “You never know what could happen on Nov. 8 — you could get stuck at work or your child could be sick.”
Voting early provides voters with the convenience of deciding when they head to the polls with several chances to go vote, Hargett said. It also assists election officials by spreading voter turnout over multiple days rather than all of the voters showing up on a single day.
“The more people that show up to early voting the more that lessens the lines on Election Day,” Hargett said.
As part of the tour Hargett and Goins are also speaking with election officials and poll workers to see how the process is running and to address any concerns.
While some news outlets across the country have reported concerns over voter fraud, Hargett said that has not been an issue in Tennessee.
“We’re hearing no reports of voter fraud,” he said. “If people see or hear irregularities they need to call us. If something happened in Tennessee we want to know about it.”
Complaints regarding possible voter fraud should be specific and first-hand, Hargett said. Some individuals have called in and said they hear reports on the news about voter fraud or someone told them that someone else had witnessed something. Those incidents are not considered reportable incidents because they do not come from first hand information. A complaint should be something that the voter saw, heard or experienced first hand, Hargett said.

In addition to promoting early voting and checking to see how polls are operating, Hargett and Goins are also promoting the state’s smart phone election app called GoVoteTN. The application is available for free through the App Store or iTunes for iPhone users and through the Google Play Store for android users.
The app provides voters with a number of useful tools including ways to check their voter registration status, precinct location, district for state and federal races and election results.
“The most important thing, I think, is it allows them to view a sample ballot and to mark it so they are prepared when they go to vote,” Hargett said.
In his experience, Hargett said, the most common problem voters encounter is when they step up to the machine to vote and find something on the ballot they were not prepared for. Viewing a sample ballot in advance gives the voters time to research the candidates if they desire and make their choice in advance. Marking the ballot on the app can also help to ensure they correctly mark their ballot at the polls, Hargett said.
“The more things we can do to help people be prepared on Election Day that is going to help everybody,” he said.
Leading up to this election, Hargett and Goins have had an extensive presence on social media through apps such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. A social media campaign to encourage eligible voters to register is at least partially credited for a large spike in voter registrations prior to this election.
On Thursday while Hargett was at the Carter County Election Office, a chance exchange on the popular app Twitter led him to make an unscheduled visit to Happy Valley Middle School, which is preparing to hold its own mock election on Monday.
Anna Johnson, a teacher at HVM sent out the following tweet Thursday morning “@SecTreHargett heard you were going to be in Carter County… time to encourage our sts to vote? Happy Valley Middle.”
Shortly thereafter, HVM Principal Jon Minton retweeted Johnson and sent his own message to Hargett “@SecTreHargett students @hvmiddle scheduled to vote Monday in our first mock election. In CC today? Endorsements and visits welcomed!!!”
Hargett received the tweets while at the Election Office and responded with “really would love to but we are on a super tight schedule. I am going to check to see what is possible.”
Minton replied “we understand…. fingers crossed!!!”
After checking his schedule, Hargett decided he would have about a 10 minute window to visit the school so he and Goins headed to Happy Valley Middle before leaving the county to head to the Washington County Election Commission.
While at the school, Hargett spoke to eighth grade students about the elections and voting and took a few questions from the students.
“You’re going to have just as many votes as I do. Everybody gets one vote,” Hargett said. “It doesn’t matter how much money you have, it doesn’t matter what part of town you live in, it doesn’t matter what education level is. Everyone gets one vote.”
He also spoke to the students about the impact social media can have.
“I am here today as a testament, frankly, to the power of social media,” Hargett said. “I was not coming to this school today. I checked Twitter this morning and saw where Ms. Johnson had given me a shoutout on Twitter and said ‘Hey, maybe you can come by and see us while you’re in Carter County.’”
Hargett told the students he checked his schedule and found a window of time to stop by.
“No one called me or anything. It was on social media,” he said. “That’s a positive thing that happened.”
While explaining the positives that social media can be used for, Hargett also offered a word of caution for the students regarding their use of social media apps.
“Use those things wisely, okay,” he said. “The things you say on there don’t just disappear because you hit delete.”
“You don’t know, one of these days you’re going to be looking for a job and somebody starts digging back through your Twitter history, your Facebook history, or Instagram and are like ‘Wow, I can’t believe that’s the person we’re thinking about hiring,’” Hargett. “Think about what you want your brand to be. Think about how you want people to know you. Whatever you type, that’s how people see you. Use it wisely.”