With primary elections coming up in New York on June 28 and August 23, it’s coming time for New Yorkers to check their voting registration status again and to make plans to vote. Issues like disenfranchisement and voter suppression are populars terms nowadays, but they’re usually looked at by New Yorkers as something that happens in states on the other political side of the country like the strict voter ID laws in Texas that prohibit voting age Texans from voting if they do not have a state identification card.

“Voter suppression comes in many forms — statutes that make it harder for certain people to vote, such as stringent ID laws, reduction in polling places [to] prohibitions on civic groups assisting the voting process,” an election lawyer named Jerry Goldfeder told me an email. “There are also lawyers and activists ostensibly acting as poll watchers but really intent on slowing down the process or intimidating voters,” he added.

While New York doesn’t have voter ID laws and has been working to increase the amount of time polls are open for voters through early voting, Goldfeder said that residents of the state still encounter unnecessary obstacles to voting.