People Are Making Long Lines at the Polls Tastier by Donating Pizza to Voters

2 minute read

There’s a chance to contribute further to supporting democracy in the U.S. even if you’ve already hit the polls.

A grassroots effort, “Pizza to the Polls,” has popped up to help concerned citizens connect with voters who need an extra boost of nutritional encouragement as they wait to fill in their ballots. The concept is simple: anyone can donate online, and the Pizza to the Polls team will do the rest, concentrating deliveries of much-needed pie at places where people are dealing with polling delays.

“Send us reports of long lines and we’ll send in the delicious reinforcements,” the site states; just report an area of need by submitting information on the site or tweeting at the account, @PizzaToThePolls. Since launching Sunday, they’ve raised nearly $18,000, ordered 273 pizzas, and are live-tweeting their deliveries to polling places in California, Pennsylvania, and Illinois. And it’s not just pizza: breakfast burritos and bagels are making their way to some lucky voters in East Hollywood, and bagels will be fueling some Philly citizens, too. They’re also asking people to simply make the orders and send them the receipts for reimbursement to cut down on time-wasting back-and-forth. A $10 donation pays for a pizza, according to their donations page.

Prior to organizing pizza deliveries, the team behind this officially non-partisan project ran a rather more political account: @TrumpHandsPAC (or the “Trump Tiny Hands PAC”), which lambasted the presidential nominee’s hand size but has now gone silent. According to the Huffington Post, the PAC’s treasurer Scott Duncombe pivoted the $2,500 leftover funds towards the pizza project, calling it a “friendlier effort.” There were no further plans for the PAC money—and he had seen long lines in his past work with non-partisan civic voter engagement groups.

“I felt the joy of handing people, in line or volunteering, a pizza,” said Duncombe. “It’s for everyone who’s there: voters, poll workers, volunteers. We’re just trying to bring a little bit of joy to people waiting to vote.”

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Write to Raisa Bruner at raisa.bruner@time.com