The City Council is aiming to simplify the voting process for thousands of inmates at Rikers Island by requiring jail authorities to assist them in correcting ballot errors. However, the Department of Corrections (DOC) has expressed concerns, arguing that this law would create significant challenges for them.
This proposal, introduced by Council Member Selvena Brooks-Powers, mandates the DOC to aid inmates in the process known as “ballot curing.”
The DOC, already under pressure, contends that the responsibility for this process should lie with the Board of Elections, not them.
“On Rikers Island, most individuals have the right to vote, but numerous obstacles hinder them from casting their ballots,” stated Brooks-Powers, a Democrat representing southeast Queens.
Her legislation would obligate the DOC and the Board of Elections to establish guidelines and timelines for sending ballot cure notifications within jails, assist voters in amending or replacing flawed absentee ballots, and release yearly statistics on the results of these efforts.
The bill currently garners support from 11 co-sponsors, in addition to the public advocate, who is a non-voting member.
About 83% of people held on Rikers are detained before and therefore could be eligible to vote if they haven’t been convicted of a felony.
However, fewer than 10% voted in recent elections, according to a Council committee report.
The average daily jail population reached about 7,100 in the 2026 fiscal year.
âVoting is our most basic right, the right from which all other rights flow,â Council Member Gale Brewer, chair of the Committee on Governmental Operations, said at a recent oversight hearing. âOn Rikers Island, very few people seem able to exercise that right.â
Although voters are supposed to be notified and given a chance to fix administrative errors on their ballots, those notices usually go to inmates addresses outside the jail so they never get them, Brooks-Powers said.
A second bill, sponsored by Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, would require an annual public report on voter registration and absentee ballot distribution in city jails, broken down by facility and demographics.
In the June 2024 primary, 364 detainees requested absentee or early mail ballots, but only 155 ballots were delivered and just 72 were counted.
âThe BOE routinely rejects registration forms and absentee ballots,â Williams said. âThis would not be acceptable in the outside world, and we should not accept it on Rikers Island.â
His bill has three other co-sponsors.
Advocates, meanwhile, urged state lawmakers to go further by authorizing in-person polling sites on Rikers, arguing the absentee-only system is effectively shutting out thousands of eligible voters.
âThis is not radical. This is not complicated. This is about meeting people where they are,â said Darren Mack, a member of the Vote in NYC Jails Coalition who was previously incarcerated.
He spoke at a rally about the issue prior to the hearing.
âPeople on Rikers maintain a constitutional right to vote,” he said, “but in practice that right is too often denied.”
