Twenty-one-year-old Galicia Malone wasn't going to let anything — even childbirth — stop her from casting a vote this morning. She swung by her polling place midlabor on her way to a local hospital, NBC Chicago reports.
Cook County Clerk David Orr said Malone's contractions were five minutes apart when she showed up around 8:30 a.m. at her precinct's location named, yes, New Life Celebration Church.
The clerk's office said Malone's water had already broken when she made the stop to vote in her first presidential election.
"If only all voters showed such determination to vote," Orr said. "My hat goes off to Galicia for not letting anything get in the way of voting. What a terrific example she is showing for the next generation, especially her new son or daughter."
In other "If she can vote, what's your excuse?" news, 99-year-old Rosie Lewis told the Huffington Post this week that, after a lifetime of political disengagement, she planned to cast her first ballot this election, sending an unambiguous message that it's never too late to begin to participate in democracy.
Lewis' milestone isn't the only remarkable first time voter story. 108-year-old Joanna Lewis is also a first time voter who plans to vote for Obama's re-election.
"Miss Rosie should be an inspiration to all of our young people and old," Lewis' friend, Gerri Ware said while Lewis registered to vote.
As a first-time voter Lewis joins a much younger crop of 18 to 21-year-old first-time voters whose passionate support of Obama has cooled down since the last election.
Read more at NBC News and the Huffington Post.