Ballotpedia's 2020 Election Help Desk Newsletter
Welcome to the first edition of Ballotpedia's Election Help Desk. In each issue, we:
- List upcoming election process dates and deadlines
- Detail the changes to election dates and procedures since our last edition
- Track lawsuits from the presidential campaigns and major political parties
- Answer one frequently asked question about the election
We understand you may have questions about what to expect in elections at all levels of government, from the casting of ballots to the certification of final results. We are dedicated to providing you with accurate, objective, and measured answers to those questions.
To continue receiving this update after this week, please click here.
Upcoming dates and deadlines
Here are the key deadlines for voter registration, early voting, and absentee/mail-in voting coming up in the next seven days. For coverage of all dates, deadlines, and requirements, click here.
- Voter registration deadlines:
- October 7:
- Missouri (in-person, mail-in postmarked, online)
- October 8:
- Idaho (mail-in postmarked)
- October 9:
- Idaho (online)
- New York (in-person, mail-in postmarked, online)
- North Carolina (in-person, mail-in postmarked, online)
- Oklahoma (in-person, mail-in postmarked)
- October 10:
- Delaware (in-person, mail-in postmarked, online)
- October 13:
- District of Columbia (mail-in received)
- Kansas (in-person, mail-in postmarked, online)
- Maryland (in-person, mail-in postmarked, online)
- Minnesota (in-person, mail-in received, online)
- New Jersey (in-person, mail-in postmarked)
- Oregon (in-person, mail-in postmarked, online)
- Virginia (in-person, mail-in received, online)
- West Virginia (in-person, mail-in postmarked, online)
- Early voting begins:
- October 7:
- October 12:
- October 13:
- Absentee/mail-in voting request or return deadlines:
- October 9:
- Kentucky (Request: online)
- October 12:
- Texas (Request: in-person)
- October 13:
- Rhode Island (Request: in-person, mail-in received)
Recent news
Roundup
- Arizona: Judge Steven Logan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona ordered the state's voter registration deadline be extended from Oct. 5 to 5:00 p.m. on Oct. 23. Two non-profits, Mi Familia Vota and the Arizona Coalition for Change, and an organizer filed a lawsuit against Secretary of State Katie Hobbs (D) alleging the original Oct. 5 registration deadline burdened their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights. The
Republican National Committee and National Republican Senatorial Committee joined Hobbs as defendants in the lawsuit. President Barack Obama (D) appointed Logan to the court.
- Florida: Secretary of State Laurel Lee (R) extended the online voter registration deadline to 7:00 p.m. EST on Oct. 6. The original registration deadline was Oct. 5, but Lee said she and Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) chose to extend the deadline after an “unprecedented volume and traffic to [the voter
registration] website” caused the website to crash. Lee’s order also extended the in-person registration deadline to 7:00 p.m. in the voter’s time zone and allows officials to accept mail-in registrations postmarked on Oct. 6.
- Iowa: Judge Robert B. Hanson of Iowa’s Fifth Judicial District issued a temporary order blocking Secretary of State Paul Pate's (R) order preventing county election officials from pre-filling absentee ballot request forms with voter identification information. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee sought the court order.
In July, Pate directed county election officials to mail absentee ballot request forms to all active registered voters. Pate's order said the request forms must be sent blank, preventing election officials from pre-filling any information.
According to the Des Moines Register’s Ian Richardson, the Donald J. Trump for President, Inc. campaign, among others, filed lawsuits in August against county auditors who had sent pre-filled forms. At least three lawsuits resulted in counties nullifying submitted pre-filled forms, affecting more than 75,000 absentee/mail-in ballot requests. Judge Hanson said officials in those counties would have to ask courts to lift their respective injunctions barring them from processing pre-filled applications.
- Michigan: On Oct. 6, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) signed a law allowing election clerks in some municipalities to begin processing absentee ballots on Nov. 2. The law also requires that clerks inform voters within 48 hours when their vote will not be counted for any reason.
According to Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson (D), voters have requested 2.7 million absentee ballots so far and have returned almost 400,000 of them. While the new law gives election clerks ten additional hours to process absentee ballots, the ballots will still be counted on election night.
The bill (SB757) passed in the Michigan Senate 34-2 and in the Michigan House 94-11. Democratic members of the Michigan Legislature unanimously passed the bill. Republicans in both chambers voted for the bill 64-13.
- South Carolina: The U.S. Supreme Court reinstated South Carolina’s witness requirement for absentee/mail-in ballots. The Court exempted ballots cast before it issued the order and those received within two days of the order from the requirement. Absentee/mail-in ballots cast after that time are subject to the witness requirement.
Under South Carolina law, voters must include the signature of a witness when submitting an absentee ballot. The Supreme Court’s decision marks the fourth change to South Carolina’s witness requirement. Federal courts have suspended, reinstated, and suspended again the requirement leading up to the Supreme Court’s decision to reinstate.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote election rules established by the legislature “ordinarily ‘should not be subject to second-guessing by an “unelected federal judiciary,”’” and that “federal courts ordinarily should not alter state election rules in the period close to an election.”
South Carolina is one of sixteen states requiring voters to provide an excuse in order to request an absentee/mail-in ballot. The state waived that requirement for the general election, extending eligibility to all active registered voters.
Lawsuits
To date, we have tracked 251 lawsuits and/or court orders involving election policy issues and the COVID-19 outbreak. Click here to view the complete list of lawsuits and court orders.
Here's the latest on noteworthy litigation, including lawsuits filed by the presidential campaigns and major political parties.
- Montana: On Sept. 30, Judge Dana Christensen of the U.S. District Court for the District of Montana declined to overturn Gov. Steve Bullock's order authorizing counties to conduct the general election largely by mail. Donald J. Trump for President, Inc. the Republican National Committee, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and the Montana Republican State Central Committee filed the original complaint. They alleged
Bullock had unconstitutionally infringed upon the state legislature's authority to regulate election administration.
Christensen said: "Ultimately, considerations of public health weigh strongly against the issuance of an injunction, even if Plaintiff's claims were meritorious." The plaintiffs have not indicated whether they intend to appeal the decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. President Obama appointed Christensen to the court.
- Texas: On Oct. 1, a group of plaintiffs including the Texas League of United Latin American Citizens, the National League of United Latin American Citizens, and the League of Women Voters of Texas, filed suit in U.S. district court against state officials, including Gov. Greg Abbott (R) and Secretary of State Ruth Hughs. The plaintiffs are asking the court to suspend Abbott's Oct. 1 order limiting the number of return locations for
absentee/mail-in ballots to one per county.
The case is pending before Judge Robert Pitman of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas. President Obama appointed Pitman to the court.
Today: Absentee/mail-in ballots and uncalled races
The Help Desk daily feature will answer one frequently asked question or provide a 50-state summary of key election dates and policies each day. Today we take a look at absentee/mail-in ballot rates and uncalled races in 2018.
According to FiveThirtyEight’s Geoffrey Skelley, 35% of voters plan to cast absentee/mail-in ballots in the upcoming general election based on an average of nine polls asking voters if they planned to vote by mail. If true, this would be a 12-percentage point increase from the 2018 election, when absentee/mail-in ballots made up about 23% of all ballots counted. Numerically, absentee/mail-in ballots made up roughly 28 million of the 120 million ballots counted in 2018.
In 40 states, less than 35% of votes were cast by mail. In 6 more than 35% of votes were cast by mail. Four states—Hawaii, Mississippi, Oregon, and South Dakota—had incomplete data and were not included in this analysis.
The map below shows absentee/mail-in votes as a percentage of total turnout for every state in the 2018 general election.
What does the share of votes counted coming from absentee/mail-in ballots mean for when we learn the results of an election? We looked back at 2018 to find out.
In 2018, the winners in 22 U.S. Senate, House, and gubernatorial elections were not determined on election night.
All of the elections that were uncalled on election night that eventually had margins of victory more than 2% took place in states where more than half of ballots were cast by mail. In races where the eventual margin of victory was less than 2%, one race was in a state where more than half of ballots were cast by mail. It remained uncalled for 30 days. In states with a smaller share of absentee/mail-in votes, the average wait time was 12 days.
Click here to read more about the comparison of absentee/mail-in votes between 2016 and 2018.
Click here to read more about uncalled races following the 2018 general election.
What we’re reading today
And a dose of calm
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