WS Chronicle

Eric S. Ellison, an attorney in Winston-Salem, has been elected chairman of the Forsyth County Democratic Party. He replaces Susan Campbell.

Ellison, who said he has worked with elections for 22 years, expects to lead the party in preparing citizens for the 2016 North Carolina Voter ID law, especially African-Americans, who will most likely be adversely affected by the law.

He has started working already, three days after being elected chairman on Saturday, April 11.

This week he spoke to The Chronicle outside the county Democratic headquarters, where a phone bank has been set up to contact voters who possibly could be affected by the new law.

“This election cycle is critically important to the African-American community,” Ellison said. “The African-American community could potentially be particularly harmed by this voter ID law.”

Ellison said his experience working with elections has prepared him for the challenge.

“For me, I stepped up because I thought it was an opportunity to make sure our community is able to address this problem,” he said. “I think this is historical.”

Ellison mentioned the movie “Selma,” which portrayed the efforts of civil rights workers to get the 1965 Voting Rights Act passed in Congress because so many African-Americans had been denied their right to vote. Their efforts were successful.

“Now, 50 years later, we’re going back to Selma,” he said, because of the North Carolina Voter ID law, which forces people to provide government-issued identification in order to vote.

Ellison has been involved with the Forsyth County Democratic Party since 2002. He has served as party attorney, party third vice chair, chair of Forsyth County Young Democrats, campaign manager for Hartsfield for District Court Judge Campaign, Triad attorney for Obama for America and executive committee member for Valene Franco for Judge Campaign.

Other officers elected at the party’s convention on Saturday, April 11 are:

*First Vice Chair, Marilynn Baker, who has extensive experience in marketing and business strategy, and competitive intelligence.

*Second Vice Chair, Phillip Carter, employed by Forsyth Technical Community College in the Learning Technology Division and by the Salvation Army as Outreach Specialist for Homeless Veterans.

*Third Vice Chair, Trent Harmon, who graduates in May from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro with a B.A. in History and Political Science.

*Secretary, Cam Choiniere, a self-employed graphic designer.

*Treasurer: Donald Dunn, a sales consultant with a large pharmaceutical company.

Each officer was elected to a two-year term.

In addition, the record crowd of Democratic delegates to the convention also elected new members to the Democratic Party State Executive Committee and Congressional District Executive Committee.

Ellison said in an earlier news release: “Making sure that each Forsyth County citizen’s right to vote is protected is our first and foremost agenda item. Further, we look forward to building a record voter turnout in the 2016 presidential election cycle. We fully expect Forsyth County to continue its trajectory towards becoming a Democratic stronghold in the State of North Carolina.”

For more information about the voter ID law, please contact Eric S Ellison at 336-918-4368 or email at ellisonlaw@earthlink.net. The Democratic Party’s website is http://forsythdemocrats.org/fd/.