“I am surprised that even in Paris there are so many votes for Trump” – Libération

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2024 American elections file Harry’s Bar has been organizing its own vote for a century in Paris for each American presidential election. Less than a week before the election, Kamala Harris is ahead of Donald Trump by a short head, which worries the Democrats.

Jeffrey and Paul (1) are leaning on the imposing wooden counter of Harry’s Bar. This Thursday, October 31, at the beginning of the afternoon, the two American expatriates, computer engineers in Paris for several years, sip a cocktail while filling out a sheet of paper. Then in turn, the thirty-year-olds get up to deposit their papers in an urn which sits majestically at the entrance to the establishment and which is kept closed by a small padlock.

Until Tuesday November 5, Harry’s Bar is organizing its “straw vote” (straw vote in English). The concept, launched for the first time here in 1924, is simple: get Americans who live or are passing through Paris to vote, ahead of the presidential election, to identify a trend across the French capital. “First, it allowed those who could not vote to still participate in the election, because voting by proxy or by mail did not existtraces Franz-Arthur Mac Elhone, owner of the establishment and great-grandson of Harry Mac Elhone, bartender who launched the first straw vote. Since then, it has become a tradition that we maintain in every election, except in 2020 because of Covid-19. All you need to do is have an American passport and come here to vote.”

If the method is not scientific, it has made its first