How safe are your ballots?
47 states, DC let you track your ballot status
USA TODAY Network reporters reviewed protocols to deal with a surge in mail-in votes in several states.
Virginia Goldberg of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania , was willing to wait for her election ballot to show up in the mail.
She doesn’t feel safe going to the polls this year because of health concerns and the pandemic. She is hopeful the absentee ballot system is going to work.
“I wish people would not give in to the fear mongering and do what is best for them – and democracy,” she said.
Goldberg is far from alone, both in her hopes of a fair election count and in casting her ballot through the mail.
Election boards across states vow they are taking steps to ensure all votes are accurately counted, pointing to laws and regulations they must follow. But this year is, of course, more complicated than most: It is a presidential election year and more people will be voting by mail than ever before due to the pandemic.
Elections officials also will have to beat back claims, even from President Donald Trump, that the votes will be compromised.
A review by the USA TODAY Network Atlantic Group found a mix of protocols taken by New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Delaware to deal with the surge in mail-in voting. That includes ensuring drop boxes are secure, allowing voters who make mistakes to quickly fix them and doing an expedient count of absentee ballots before and/or after Election Day to limit prolonged uncertainty.
What ballots will be counted?
There is reason to be careful with your mail-in ballots.
While complaints by Trump that mail-in balloting is rigged have been largely unfounded, USA TODAY predicted that if half of the country were to vote by mail this year, it could lead to 1 million votes being rejected or discarded for a variety of mistakes. Those are the same issues that local election boards are hoping to guard against. And there have been some hiccups.
In Luzerne County, Pennsylvania., a temporary worker recently tossed some military and overseas ballots into the trash. A federal investigation is ongoing, but Pennsylvania Department of State officials say it appears to have been “a bad error” – not intentional fraud.
In New York, a Rochester printer sent out 100,000 absentee ballots mainly to New York City that some had incorrect names on return envelopes. It had to send out a whole new batch.
But experts said those mishaps are small and shouldn’t impact voters’ confidence in the election system.
In Pennsylvania, a key battleground, nearly 3 million mail-in ballots are expected to be cast for Nov. 3, said Terry Madonna, a political analyst at Franklin & Marshall College. But a recent poll showed the majority of voters are still expected to head to the polls. So the election has multifaceted challenges: Election officials have to make sure there is enough staff to handle in-person voting and enough to handle absentee ballots.
In Maryland, ballot counting takes place in a secure room, and the ballot-scanning machines are shut down and sealed to prevent tampering after each day of canvassing.
David Garreis, the president of the Maryland Association of Election Officials, said election results will only be accessible to a small number of workers and will be stored electronically in the voting machines, which are sealed.
How will votes be kept secure
Nineteen states allow election officials to notify voters if problems occur with their ballots and offer an opportunity to fix them, according to Votingrightslab.org.
In New York, a settlement between the state and the League of Women Voters requires counties to allow voters to fix certain mistakes before ballots are counted. “If there’s an issue with your signature or you didn’t seal your inner envelope or if you forgot to sign, those are all now curable issues in New York state,” said Jennifer Wilson, deputy director of the league’s New York chapter.
In New Jersey, if a ballot is found to be defective, such as a voter not signing the certification, election officials must notify the voter of the error and send them another ballot to fill out.
In Pennsylvania, “naked ballots” without the secrecy envelope returned will not be counted.
Forty-seven states and the District of Columbia have online portals that allow voters to track the status of their ballots. Some states, though, admit they are entering a system they are not used to.
New Jerseyans will vote almost entirely by mail for the first time in a general election. The state set up drop boxes to place them.