Betty Cartledge casts her very first vote on Wednesday in Georgia during early voting after he late husband did not let her vote for her entire life. Her husband died last year so she felt it was time to finally make her voice heard in this years election.

In her 81 years of life, Georgia resident Betty Cartledge had never cast a vote in any election, because her husband did not want her to.

That all changed on Wednesday when the 81-year-old went to her local polling place to cast her very first vote in the 2024 general election. Her husband recently passed away so she felt that it was the right time to make her voice heard in what many are calling the most important election in American history.

Im going to vote for the first time in my life, she told WSB-TV Atlanta outside the polls at an early voting location in Covington, Georgia, on Wednesday.

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I was so young and everything when we got married, I never really thought about it, Cartledge told the outlet. And then I got old, and I thought that it wouldnt count to vote,” Cartledge told the outlet.

Cartledge told the outlet that she now believes that voting at her age is just as important as it is for the younger generation.

After casting her vote she came out of the polling place saying the experience was “neat” and saying she’d “likely be back again. Georgia is a key swing state in the presidential election with Joe Biden carrying the state for the Democrats in 2020 for the first time since Bill Clinton carried the state in 1992.

News of Cartledge first time voting went viral on Tiktok and X (formerly Twitter) with many users praising the 81-year-old for her participation in the election.

“This both enrages me, but also makes me happy for her that he can’t hold her back anymore,” one user wrote on TikTok.

“My grandma was never allowed to learn how to drive. We cannot go back,” one user wrote on TikTok. “The fact that she voted at the FIRST opportunity shows she did actually think about it. She’s been waiting to vote for years,” another user wrote.

Many across social media platforms pointed out that Cartledge is most likely one of many women across the U.S who let their husbands dictate their vote.

How many women in America are there who are repressed by controlling husbands? Unfortunately, I have a feeling there are quite a few, they argued.

Misogyny is an insane thing for a woman who had the right to vote for her entire lifetime and never got to do it until now, another added.

Many online pointed out the poetic nature of this election as it is only the second time that a woman has appeared on the ballot as a major party nominee and it being the election Cartledge is casting the first vote of her life. Vice President Kamala Harris if she were to defeat former President Donald Trump in November would become not only the first woman president but the first woman of color to occupy the Oval Office.

The race for the White House is extremely tight going into the final stretch so every vote, especially in swing states like Georgia, will matter. Cartledge did not disclose to the outlet who she was casting her vote for in the presidential election. She will turn 82-years-old on Sunday. Many online added that it was beautiful that Cartledge was able to “Find her voice.”