Polls opened at 6 a.m. on Tuesday, March 17 for the Illinois primary election in Jackson and Williamson county, where there was a  low but steady turnout of voters. 

“The midterm elections always have a low turnout, it’s bad,” Donna Gibson, a poll worker at Carbondale City Hall said. By 10 a.m., the location had only received nine votes. 

Precinct 25 in Grinnell Hall on SIU’s campus had their first voter arrive at 1 p.m. The precinct consists mostly of students. Jane Dougherty, an English professor at SIU and poll worker said the turnout has been slow.

“I think one of the issues is that we are in precinct 25, which is very student heavy, and students tend to move around a lot,” Dougherty said. “We’ve had a few students come in to vote who we had to send to City Hall so they could register and vote there because they weren’t on our roster.” 

SIU student Tayja Sykes had just this problem. She went up to vote in Grinnell Hall and wasn’t able to since her voter location changed when she updated her driver’s license. She went to City Hall to reregister and vote, also convincing some of her friends to do the same. 

“I want to see a different future, so I came out to vote,” she said. 

Dougherty recommended people make a plan to register before election day in November and figure out where they will be voting. 

“There are long lines of students who are trying to register to vote on election day and we’ve had students who’ve had to sit in like a three or four hour line to get them registered and get them into the place where they vote,” Dougherty said.  

According to the Jackson County unofficial results, 24% of registered voters went to the polls. Voter turnout in Williamson County was 25%, according to the county’s unofficial results. 

Digital Editor Peyton Cook can be reached at [email protected], or on Instagram at @cookmeavisual.

Gallery • 6 Photos

Peyton Cook

Residents line up to vote and fill out their ballots March 17, 2026 at Fire Station 1 in Marion, Illinois.

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