WaPo: A voter registration group with a history of sending error-ridden mailers has again sown confusion in Virginia, this time tapping into concerns about mail-in ballots sparkedby President Trump’s repeated allegations — without evidence — of election fraud.The Washington-based Center for Voter Information, a nonprofit geared … Continue reading
Category Archives: absentee ballots
Tennesseean: Fear of COVID-19 will not be a reason to vote by mail in the November general election, the Tennessee Supreme Court ruled Wednesday. Absentee ballots filed for Thursday’s primary will remain valid, according to the court.The high court’s decision reverses a … Continue reading
Nevada Independent: President Donald Trump’s campaign has sued Nevada over a contentious bill recently approved in the ongoing special session of the Nevada Legislature that expands mail-in voting for the 2020 general election, saying it would make voter fraud “inevitable.”The … Continue reading
Jennifer Rubin WaPo column. … Continue reading
News & Observer: Fears of coronavirus endangering voters in North Carolina this fall — or potentially lowering voter turnout — aren’t enough to force the state to change many of its elections laws, a federal judge has ruled.However, U.S. District … Continue reading
Rutgers Today: Likely voters throughout the country say the surge of coronavirus makes it even more important to vote by mail in November, with 64 percent of Americans and 70 percent of New Jerseyeans supporting the provision, according to a new … Continue reading
NYT: In his latest assault on voting by mail, President Trump said on Monday that he thought the Democratic primary in New York’s 12th Congressional District should be rerun because of lengthy delays in counting mail-in ballots. Prompted by a … Continue reading
WaPo: President Trump’s unfounded attacks on mail balloting are discouraging his own supporters from embracing the practice, according to polls and Republican leaders across the country, prompting growing alarm that one of the central strategies of his campaign is threatening … Continue reading
Politico: President Donald Trump threatened legal action Monday after Nevada’s legislature passed a bill to mail ballots to all active voters, suggesting that the measure would make it impossible for Republicans to win there in November’s general election.“In an illegal … Continue reading
NPR: This past week, President Trump renewed his unsubstantiated claim that mail-in voting begets inaccurate or fraudulent results when he raised the prospect of delaying November’s election.“With Universal Mail-In Voting (not Absentee Voting, which is good), 2020 will be the … Continue reading
Charles Stewart has posted this important draft on SSRN. Here is the abstract: A “lost vote” occurs when a voter does all that is asked of her, and yet her vote is uncounted in the final tally. Estimating the magnitude … Continue reading
Texas Tribune: Gov. Greg Abbott on Monday extended the early voting period for the November election by six days, citing continued challenges posed by the coronavirus pandemic.Early voting for the Nov. 3 election will now begin Oct. 13 instead of Oct. 19. … Continue reading
AP: Deep-pocketed and often anonymous donors are pouring over $100 million into an intensifying dispute about whether it should be easier to vote by mail, a fight that could determine President Donald Trump’s fate in the November election.In the battleground … Continue reading
Rosalind Helderman for WaPo. White House officials said the president has railed privately about the New Jersey city’s election to his advisers. And conservative groups have launched their own efforts to spotlight the problems in Paterson, including Judicial Watch and … Continue reading
WaPo: The city’s hottest primary election is the 12th Congressional District.In one corner, you have Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney, a pal of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s who has been in Congress since 1993 and was recently elected chair of the … Continue reading
WPR: A bipartisan coalition of high-level Wisconsin politicians has launched an initiative to educate voters about in-person and mail-in voting during the COVID-19 pandemic.The initiative, VoteSafe WI, supports both in-person voting and absentee voting by mail for the August partisan … Continue reading
WaPo: Gov. Larry Hogan on Monday defended his decision to hold a traditional election in November, despite growing concerns from voting rights advocates and election officials about the impact of his choice amid a global pandemic.Hogan (R) said he opted for a … Continue reading
News Service of Florida: On the eve of a trial slated to begin Monday, lawyers representing the state and plaintiffs in a legal battle over Florida’s vote-by-mail procedures have reached a settlement.Priorities USA, Dream Defenders and other plaintiffs have been … Continue reading
AP reports. … Continue reading
CNN: Republican officials throughout the country are reacting with growing alarm to President Donald Trump’s attacks on mail-in ballots, saying his unsubstantiated claims of mass voting fraud are already corroding the views of GOP voters, who may ultimately choose not to vote … Continue reading
AP: The Michigan appeals court denied a request to require the counting of absentee ballots received after the time polls close on Election Day, ruling that the deadline remains intact despite voters’ approval of a constitutional amendment that expanded mail-in … Continue reading
Politico: President Donald Trump’s harsh rhetoric against mail-in voting is causing a big problem for Florida Republicans, who once dominated the practice here.So the state GOP came up with a solution: They doctored one of Trump’s tweets on the issue … Continue reading
AJC: Election officials in Fulton County are refusing to accept emailed absentee ballot requests, an apparent violation of Georgia voting laws.The county’s decision to reject emailed absentee ballot applications comes after it struggled to manage a flood of requests before the June … Continue reading
I have written this article for L.A. Lawyer. It begins: California has been in the vanguard of election reform, passing voting rules that modernize the election process and make it easier to register and vote, such as same day an … Continue reading
Hartford Courant: “We have evidence of people who received absentee ballot applications who have been deceased for more than a decade,” Romano said, adding that the ballots are supposed to be sent only to active voters. “We found an example … Continue reading
Pam Fessler and Elena Moore: Mail-in voting, which tens of millions of Americans are expected to use this November, is fraught with potential problems. Hundreds of thousands of ballots go uncounted each year because people make mistakes, such as forgetting to … Continue reading
Texas Tribune: If the primary runoff elections are a test run for November, cracks are becoming apparent in the state’s voting system as it struggles to function under the strain of rampant coronavirus spread.Early voting is over, and Tuesday is … Continue reading
TAP: This year, the Postal Service will also be essential to the national elections, as more Americans than ever opt to vote by mail because of the coronavirus. Weakening, privatizing, or eliminating the Postal Service at this critical time could … Continue reading
WaPo editorial: Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) seems not to have learned them. He presided over a largely mail-in primary election in his state last month that saw strong turnout based on extremely high levels of absentee voting — but that also … Continue reading
CNN: President Donald Trump has railed against “mail-in voting” while defending “absentee voting,” baffling experts who say those voting systems are essentially the same thing.Trump made the claims in a series of tweets Friday morning, which included some of his previously debunked … Continue reading
The Guardian: As more Americans vote by mail this year amid the Covid-19 pandemic, there’s concern that thousands of eligible voters like Weisfeld could have their ballots rejected for small errors without a chance to fix them. Mail-in ballots were more … Continue reading
WaPo reports. … Continue reading
WaPo: President Trump’s relentless attacks on the security of mail voting are driving suspicion among GOP voters toward absentee ballots — a dynamic alarming Republican strategists, who say it could undercut their own candidates, including Trump himself.In several primaries this … Continue reading
NYRB. … Continue reading
NYT reports. … Continue reading
Smart Cities reports. … Continue reading
The Supreme Court (having already turned down emergency relief related to the Texas primary) has rejected early consideration in the case arguing that giving only voters over the age of 65 the ability to vote by mail without excuse violates … Continue reading
NBC New York reports. … Continue reading
NPR: When voters cast a ballot in person in New Jersey, they are required to sign a poll book to match their signature to election records. The same is true of mail-in ballots, and election officials check the ballot to … Continue reading
That’s right. Faxing. … Continue reading
Tampa Bay Times: More than 18,000 Floridians who voted by mail in March’s presidential primary did not have their votes counted, according to an analysis done by a group of national elections experts and academics.The numbers of uncounted mail ballots, … Continue reading
The case is Merrill v. People First and the state’s petition is here. Here is my earlier coverage of the 11th Circuit ruling and the district court order. Justice Thomas asked for a response by July 2 and the election … Continue reading
WaPo reports. … Continue reading
NBC New York: A Paterson, New Jersey, councilman and a councilman-elect in the same city, along with two other men, face voting fraud charges in connection with the May 12 special election, the state attorney general’s office said Thursday.Councilmember Michael … Continue reading
CalMatters reports. … Continue reading
ACLU press release. … Continue reading
AP reports. … Continue reading
Greg Sargent WaPo column. … Continue reading
State of Politics reports. … Continue reading
Announcement: Absentee Balloting: Preparing for the November Election Podcast episode explores what can be done to mitigate the risks this November With November’s election less than five months away, and the likelihood of larger-than-average numbers of citizens requesting absentee ballots, … Continue reading