Mail-in ballot surge
15 times as many requests than in ’16 vote
New Yorkers have requested more than 15 times as many ballots for this month’s Democratic primary as they did for the presidential primary in 2016, according to the city Board of Elections, meaning the upcoming vote could contain plenty of surprises.
The board said Monday it had sent voters about 381,000 mail-in ballots as of June 9, the latest date for which info was available, compared with 23,775 total absentee and military ballots filed in April 2016.
The board had received about 437,000 applications to receive a mail-in ballot as of June 9 and is still processing them. New York voters overwhelmingly request mail-in ballots to the Board of Elections
ahead of the primary
Given the huge number of mail-in ballots and the high number of heated primaries this year, the outcome of many races likely won’t be known the night of June 23, official Election Day. For contests in which onsite voting yields a margin of victory smaller than the number of mail-in ballots that were sent in, the board opens up the mailbag to determine a victor, a potentially lengthy process.
“It’s not elections as usual,” said Councilman Fernando Cabrera (D-Bronx), head of the Governmental Operations Committee.
“For most of these results, it’s going to take at least a whole week to determine a preliminary winner.”
This year marks the first contest in which the state has allowed early voting at polling sites. The process got off to a feeble start, with just 4,037 people casting votes throughout the five boroughs on Saturday, according to the board.
But the numbers appear to be steadily increasing, with 7,269 votes cast Sunday and 10,397 Monday, bringing the total to date to 21,703.
Cabrera speculated that widespread protests — and fears of catching coronavirus — have kept voters away from early voting sites.
“You have thousands of people literally walking by a polling site [during protests]. I think the vast majority of people are going to wait to the end,” the councilman said of voters who don’t do mail-in ballots.
Among some of the problems Georgia faced in its June 9 primaries, some poll workers reportedly didn’t want to clock in due to fears of catching the virus.
But the board has tried to keep its sites safe by providing 10,000 dividers to separate poll workers and voters. It’s also acquired about 10,000 face masks and will distribute anti-viral wipes and individual pens for voters.
“We’re confident that we’ll have enough poll workers for the June 23 election, and that is why it’s been so important for us to make sure we have all these safety precautions in place,” said board spokeswoman Valerie Vazquez.