Just saw a disturbing report on CNN about mail-in ballots.

[kentuck]

They were reporting on the number of mail-in ballots that were disqualified because of "different" or "no signature". Almost 2% of all ballots mailed in by African-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, and Asian-Americans were disqualified for lack of proper signature. That is a huge amount of votes!

That could mean the difference between victory and defeat in the election.

[Squinch]

1. I'd bet money that percentage will be higher in red and republican-controlled swing states.

[LuvJoe]

8. I think the news has to show detailed process how to do mail in or absentee voting on TV live

[Maraya1969]

10. Welcome to DU LuvJoe!

[LuvJoe]

12. Thank you, I have been reading DU since 2016 and I finally joined in

[kentuck]

13. Welcome!

[Rebl2]

18. I agree

as well as secretary of state’s and maybe commercials specific to each state. I know the local channel I watch most often has been (since August) talking about vote by mail and absentee voting and what is required quite often. Another channel I watch occasionally doesn’t seem to talk about it nearly as much. By the way, neither is a fox channel.

[LisaL]

2. Is that from past elections?

As far as I can tell only North Carolina has already started to vote absentee. Wisconsin is delayed by a Supreme Court who is deciding whether to add Greens on the ballot.

[RDANGELO]

3. yep.

I think that I read somewhere that about 1.5% of mail in don't get counted for one reason or another.

[LisaL]

4. I believe that in many states, election boards have to notify the voter

and allow the voter to fix the issue. It certainly is a concern, but at least there is some possibility of resolving the issue. Some states now only vote by mail.

[kentuck]

5. One person had only signed their initial on their ballot and it was not accepted.

They were interviewing that person on CNN so they must have been told about it?

[LisaL]

6. Yep, they are supposed to be notified

if ballot is not accepted. Or people can track their ballots themselves, and I guess contact the election board if there is an issue.

[yellowdogintexas]

16. this is true in Texas! I made a mistake on my first vote by mail

and the ballot, the envelope which disqualified my ballot and a set of new envelopes arrived in time for me to send my ballot back.

We used to have this rule that you sealed the mailing envelope then signed it. I signed it then sealed it and it kicked back. Fortunately I had mailed early because I was traveling, so when I got home it was right there in my mail box. I sent it right back, mistake corrected.

That signature rule has been removed!

Yet another reason to mail it in EARLY!!

Our ballots are being sent to voters Sept 25.

[LisaL]

19. I wonder how they would know if you signed it before or after sealing the envelope?

NT

[MichMan]

26. I know it varies by state, but what's the timframe for correcting after notification?

By the end of election day, within 24 hrs after, a week?

[LisaL]

34. That also varies by state.

NT

[5X]

7. 2% of almost anything statistically is a normal amount of waste.

[kentuck]

11. I don't think that would be acceptable in a political race?

A lot of races are determined by 2% or less. That would throw a lot of races into dispute.

[LiberalFighter]

14. If this report was about past elections it is a good thing.

Because then people will hopefully be more careful about completing their ballot.

[Pobeka]

15. Silver lining? -- left leaning voters are more likely to watch CNN and get the message

Right leaning are not watching CNN and may make the signature mistakes.

[ancianita]

17. This is what happened 2016.

Note that of the top ten rejecting states, seven were red states.


If you think CNN was being objective, fine. To me it sounds as if they are amplifying doubt.

[crickets]

27. Look at GA and FL. Wow. nt

[ancianita]

28. Yep, they're big on mail in rejections.

They'll probably try it again, too.

[jaxexpat]

20. If you do not know and follow ALL the directions on how to vote by mail.......

If you cannot confirm that your mail-in ballot was counted in time to resend another one.....
If you aren't sure if your county, state or precinct is going to make good faith efforts to count your mail-in ballot.....
If you can't get your mail-in ballot in the mail with all the required directions followed to the letter in a timely fashion....
If you're cock-sure you've done it all right but can't recall ALL the instructions.....
If you're NOT certain your mail-in ballot was counted by election day.....
If you're NOT certain your mail-in ballot was received by election day.....
If you think that a post mark date is adequate to ensure your mail-in ballot getting counted.....
If you're not sure you can vote alternately AFTER mailing a ballot you don't think is going to be counted.....
If you think the USPS postmaster gen. IS SLOWING the delivery of mail-in ballots and requests for Mail-in ballots.....
If you understand how easily the republicans can hide the swindling of over 2% of mail-in votes.....
If you understand the republicans have already set in place the means and methods to do the above.....
If you understand that a 2% loss of counted votes will likely defeat Democrats disproportionately....

And you STILL insist on mail-in voting.....

Then, prepare for the increased probability of 4 more years with Trump. WITHOUT a senate Democratic majority.

Remember, It was the inability of courts to expedite their schedules and the hell-bent intention of republicans acting in bad faith to delay and STOP the Florida recount and then use the constitutional inauguration date as a demand to install Bush (even without a complete ballot tally, the Florida recount remains incomplete today). In the confusion of careful GOP planning, Al Gore and a Democratic government were stifled, we have: 2007-08 middle class economic collapse, California and a middle east on fire, Trump and $3 trillion national debt as our reward.

Does anybody REALLY think the republicans have given up their dirty tricks? Do you think Murdock is going anti-trump? and won't tailor his network to defeating Biden?

[ooky]

24. I'm masking up.

[ancianita]

29. You know the post office offers mail tracking service, right?

Ballot tracking through the U.S. Postal Service: In many jurisdictions, including California, Colorado and Florida, ballot envelopes are equipped with intelligent mail bar codes linked to the postal service that enable voters and election officials alike to track an envelope from drop-off to delivery and processing at the local administrator’s office. Denver’s elections division reported that 17,931 people used its system to track the status of their ballots during the November 2013 election. While relatively new, these ballot tracking systems are now readily available and are easily operable at scale. This way, if a voter says they never received their ballot, states can better determine whether the ballot was delivered, replace the ballot as appropriate, and ensure the original is flagged as compromised and not counted.

https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/false-narrative-vote-mail-fraud




There are also chain-of-custody services that some states use.
https://www.fastcompany.com/90501588/track-your-ballot-like-a-package-how-technology-will-smooth-the-way-for-novembers-mail-in-ballot-surge

[jaxexpat]

30. That's all good. And I'm sure it streamlines the whole ballot voting/counting process.

Tracking services available through the USPS.....
Chain of custody services in SOME states.....

Well golly and Shazam. So many EASY ways to get things done in this modern world of wonders.

Political parties, for instance, Democrats are, as usual, trying to get the undecided and never-before-voted to make the effort to vote for them and their righteous cause. That's a chore in itself, like pushing a limp cotton string up the side of a power pole in order to knock a bird off the wire at the top. (Or something like that, anyway it's impossibly difficult to do with a limp string.) But, if I get this right, somehow a third-party tracking/security process, itself another complexity in which this voter must learn a procedure and THEN implement and monitor it at some point, IMPROVES the odds that voters will act as desired? and their vote gets counted? Received even. Or if not. Then, hopefully in time, to send another ballot on it's way into the hands of people whose goal is NOT to ensure that ballots are counted but rather to be sure that all the signatures, co-signatures, addresses and boxes are checked, filled in or ex-ed in, to the correct specification. Why is it so easy to forget that the USA is overly blessed with a plethora of LOW-INFO and poorly motivated potential voters? Obviously, there is no easily recognizable, pre-agreed and implemented plan to inform voters en-masse how to do this mail-in vote thing. Obviously, there can't be such a plan, since almost every state has it's own peculiar and individually torturous path to counted-vote-nirvana.

Will Rogers' quote still rings out loud and true, " I don't belong to any organized party, I'm a Democrat." Many credit his simple, plain truth and humor, approach to politics as a harvest of well wishes from the heartland that Roosevelt hadn't expected. He, like senator Wellstone, should never have ridden small planes in contentious times.

[ancianita]

31. I hear you about third parties. I don't trust them, either.

And as long as there is one Republican working in the postal system, we have a right to worry. Bar codes do help in registering the chain of custody along the way.

However, it is a federal crime for anyone from point of origin to point of delivery -- anyone along the way -- to tamper, alter, misplace and/or otherwise lose US mail -- and bar codes track at what point that happens.

You don't have to trust any service. Bottom line, you could even drive your ballot to your state's Sec. of State's office before anyone else could get it there, then have it time stamped and photograph that.

I'm sending my ballot from Florida (COVID exiled here) to Illinois, my voting state of residence. I'm mailing it First Class, with the tracking code that I get whenever I send First Class or Priority mail. It had better get there or I'll know the reason why.

18 U.S. Code § 1708. Theft or receipt of stolen mail matter gen­erally


Whoever steals, takes, or abstracts, or by fraud or deception obtains, or attempts so to obtain, from or out of any mail, post office, or station thereof, letter box, mail receptacle, or any mail route or other authorized depository for mail matter, or from a letter or mail carrier, any letter, postal card, package, bag, or mail, or abstracts or removes from any such letter, package, bag, or mail, any article or thing contained therein, or secretes, embezzles, or destroys any such letter, postal card, package, bag, or mail, or any article or thing contained therein; or

Whoever steals, takes, or abstracts, or by fraud or deception obtains any letter, postal card, package, bag, or mail, or any article or thing contained therein which has been left for collection upon or adjacent to a collection box or other authorized depository of mail matter; or

Whoever buys, receives, or conceals, or unlawfully has in his possession, any letter, postal card, package, bag, or mail, or any article or thing contained therein, which has been so stolen, taken, embezzled, or abstracted, as herein described, knowing the same to have been stolen, taken, embezzled, or abstracted—

Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.

(June 25, 1948, ch. 645, 62 Stat. 779; May 24, 1949, ch. 139, § 39, 63 Stat. 95; July 1, 1952, ch. 535, 66 Stat. 314; Pub. L. 103–322, title XXXIII, § 330016(1)(I), Sept. 13, 1994, 108 Stat. 2147.)

I understand your position. Do what you think best for you. But let's not scare each other about the trustworthiness of the USPS. It knows it's on close watch.

[jaxexpat]

36. I'm not scared about the trustworthiness of the USPS. Quite the opposite.

I proudly and faithfully stand in long lines, arthritic fingers cramping an indelible hold onto my boxes, to mail my packages. Never yet to have one mishandled in any way. Even the one to Germany was received unscathed. I have, though, found my neighbor's mail in my mailbox. My wife and I took it to their doors personally. Nice way to get to know the neighborhood. We like to help each other on close watch as well.

Pleasant to chat.

[LeftInTX]

21. I think less educated people are more likely to have problems

I am surprised about Asian-Americans.

I gave instructions during our runoff to many first time vote by mail applicants. These were all college educated. They would forget to check this or that. I think one retired colonel used her PO Box for her residential address and didn't receive her ballot.

During the runoff, I said, "We need a book on mail voting for dummies".

My mother in law sent for her's and did something wrong, so she has to submit the application again. I don't know what she did wrong. She is registered to vote and I'm thinking she accidentally put in a wrong address somewhere.

[aikoaiko]

22. This was a big deal in GA in 2018 - ballot signatures not matching license/ID signatures

At the least that was the claim by officials.

[LisaL]

23. GA is the state that rejected more absentee ballots (in % of total absentee ballots)

than any other state, per that chart posted on this thread. Very high absentee rejection rate in GA.

[rockfordfile]

25. The Democratic Party needs to check it out

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

32. Yes. Now i'm worried about my absentee ballot.

When I sign it, should I write clearly, like I did when I registered to vote 40 years ago? Or should I use the current illegible scrawl. Should I sign with my middle name? Middle initial? How did I sign 40 years ago? I can't remember.

Am I worried about nothing?

Maybe I should take my absentee ballot to the polling precinct on 11/3 and see if it passes.

[LisaL]

33. Have you voted absentee prior to this election?

Make sure the rules of your state allow you to take your ballot to the polling place. In OH you can't do that.
Depending on your state, rules differ, but in many states you can track your ballot to see if it was accepted. Many states also allow you to correct any issues. So you want to get that ballot in as soon as possible, usually.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

35. Voted absentee many times. I wonder if any of them counted.

But this time, I envision brown-shirted election inspectors from DHS to check for hanging chads, or for specs of ink outside the oval, anything to invalidate "D" votes.

[LisaL]

37. You never tracked your ballot?

NT

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

38. No. Didn't see the point.

I always drove the ballot to city hall and handed it to the clerk, never used mail.

The clerk inspected the envelope to see that it had a signature, then put it in a box.

The clerk can't look at the ballots until election day. Can't even open the ballots to unfold them and lay them flat in preparation for counting on election day.

Pre-election day, tracking would only show that the clerk has the ballot. I already knew that.

Maybe this year, I'll track it, just for the heck of it.