Pandemic is pushing states to problematic vote-by-mail

WASHINGTON — States and local election jurisdictions across the country are preparing for a surge in voting by mail this November stemming from people’s reluctance to gather in crowds or even venture out if the coronavirus pandemic persists through late fall.

The switch to mail-in ballots is likely to heighten security challenges both on cyber and physical fronts

While many western states including Oregon, Washington, Colorado and parts of California already rely heavily on vote-bymail, states east of the Mississippi are likely to see an increase in absentee voter requests and for vote-bymail, and are preparing for that, Ben Hovland, chairman of the Election Assistance Commission, told CQ Roll Call in an interview.

In conference calls with state officials, Hovland said he has heard them discuss changes in processes and procedures to prepare for a surge in vote-by-mail and the risks that could stem from the shift.

“It adds to an already difficult job that state election officials face,” Hovland said. “People need to be aware of potential new risk vectors in as far as some jurisdictions are talking about creating an online portal for voters to request mail-in ballots.”

“Voting by mail is not like flipping a switch,” Hovland said. “There may be as much work as running a polling place.”

States already have postponed presidential primaries because of fears of spreading the virus through polling places.

In the stimulus bill , Congress also has provided $400 million in federal grants to the Election Assistance

Commission to be used to help states cope with the challenges they would face from an increased reliance on voteby-mail.

The federal grant is only a fraction of what it might cost states to gear up for a switch toward mailed ballots. The Brennan Center for Justice has estimated that it would take as much as $2 billion to cast votes by mail as well as for proper sanitization of voting places.

“‘States need money yesterday for vote-bymail,’ ” Amy Klobuchar, DMinn., quoted Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate telling her aides on a recent call.

Klobuchar and Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said Republican members of Congress also are showing greater interest in vote-by-mail systems. Wyden has been pushing vote-by-mail legislation since 2002 but has been routinely met with fears of a “federal takeover” of elections, he said. But that may be changing as a result of the pandemic, he said.

Wyden and Klobuchar said in the absence of established procedures for mailing ballots, elderly voters may be forced to go to physical polling stations where they’re likely to encounter elderly poll workers, and those interactions could further exacerbate the spread of the pandemic.

The push toward voteby-mail means that online voter registration systems will likely face a growing demand and states have to be prepared for that, said Larry Norden, director of the election reform project at the Brennan Center.

“You’re going to have to put even more focus on the online voter registration system and even more on the registration databases,”

Norden said. Those databases will have to be accurate and up to date to verify the people voting by mail.

The Senate Intelligence Committee last year said in a report that, during the 2016 election, Russian intelligence services conducted reconnaissance on election systems including voter registration databases in all 50 states. The Department of Homeland Security has said publicly that only 21 states’ computer systems were targeted, and seven were breached. U.S. officials have said no details were changed or votes were altered as a result.

Hacking and altering the database is not the only concern, Norden said. The online registration sites and portals that allow voters to ask for mailed ballots should be capable of handling the surge and be secure from denial of service attacks, he said.

With large-scale use of mailed ballots, provisional ballots that are often handed out on Election Day to a voter whose identity cannot be verified at a precinct are no longer an option, and therefore the integrity of registration databases “becomes even more important,” Norden said. “You’ve got to audit the database beforehand to ensure it’s accurate,” and states have to undertake penetration testing of their cyber defenses to make sure the systems can withstand an attack, he said.

But a surge in mailed ballots also could yield some upsides — more paper ballots means that they all can be audited. The combination of changes already made by states since the 2016 election and a potential rise in vote-by-mail could mean that well more than 90 percent of voters may generate a paper ballot in November, Norden said.