102-year-old woman casts her mail-in ballot in PPE, says to voters, 'So can you'

October 5, 2020October 5, 2020 WKXA

Darylann Elmi/iStockBy GMA TEAM, ABC News

(CHICAGO) — A 102-year-old woman who just cast her mail-in ballot for the 2020 election has a message for other would-be voters, “If I can do it, so can you.”

“That’s why I had my grandson take a photo of me because if I could come out at the age of 102 and vote, so can you,” Bea Lumpkin, of Chicago, told ABC News’ Good Morning America. “I think that in this election more than any other that I’ve taken part in, the only way we can answer it is for the people to come out and vote and stay active to a degree that we’ve ever seen before.”

“I think we can do it,” she said.

The photo, taken by Lumpkin’s grandson and shared on Instagram by the Chicago Teacher’s Union, shows the 102-year-old holding her ballot in front of a USPS mailbox while wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Lumpkin, a retired teacher, cast her first ballot in the 1940 presidential election and said not even a global pandemic would stop her perfect streak of voting in every election since, for the past eight decades.

“There’s a lot at stake,” she said about the 2020 election, a presidential year that features President Donald Trump running against former Vice President Joe Biden. “If you never bothered to vote before and if you care anything about the children coming after us, you’ll come out and vote this time.”

Lumpkin, a mother of four, grandmother of three and great grandmother of one, said she is looking to the next generation of voters to continue moving America and democracy forward.

“I have a lot of confidence in the young people,” she said.