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jennlkSomebody tried to tell me that requiring Absentee Ballots to be received by the clerk's office by 8pm on Election Day is a form of voter suppression. Wha?
Look, you can have an extended deadline, or timely results. You cannot have both. You want certified results by Wednesday? You cannot count the ballots coming in the mail on Wednesday afternoon. (Yes, provisional and challenged ballots are counted later, but the results are not certified until they are counted. Many more precincts have absentee ballots than provisional or challenged ballots.)
It's not like it's a secret that absentee ballots must be received by 8pm on Election Day. Says so right on the envelope. All of them. And on the application for an Absentee Ballot. The ballot envelopes specifically say to allow at least 7 days for ballots to arrive at the clerk's office, and to drop the ballot in a drop box if it's less than 7 days before Election Day. {ETA: this year, there was an insert strongly suggesting that voters use the drop box if it was less than 14 days until Election Day. (The envelopes were all printed last year, before USPS got hamstrung.)}
A voter has a certain level of responsibility here. It's the Voter's Responsibility to submit their Absentee Ballot by the deadline if they want it to be counted.
If you're not sure that it's arrived? Call the clerk's office. Many states have those records on-line, so you don't even have to call.
Look, you can have an extended deadline, or timely results. You cannot have both. You want certified results by Wednesday? You cannot count the ballots coming in the mail on Wednesday afternoon. (Yes, provisional and challenged ballots are counted later, but the results are not certified until they are counted. Many more precincts have absentee ballots than provisional or challenged ballots.)
It's not like it's a secret that absentee ballots must be received by 8pm on Election Day. Says so right on the envelope. All of them. And on the application for an Absentee Ballot. The ballot envelopes specifically say to allow at least 7 days for ballots to arrive at the clerk's office, and to drop the ballot in a drop box if it's less than 7 days before Election Day. {ETA: this year, there was an insert strongly suggesting that voters use the drop box if it was less than 14 days until Election Day. (The envelopes were all printed last year, before USPS got hamstrung.)}
A voter has a certain level of responsibility here. It's the Voter's Responsibility to submit their Absentee Ballot by the deadline if they want it to be counted.
If you're not sure that it's arrived? Call the clerk's office. Many states have those records on-line, so you don't even have to call.
