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With New Year’s Day and a big election year almost upon us, electionlineWeekly has released its annual “In and Out” list. It’s a crowd-sourced look at what’s hot and what’s not for the election community as 2020 dawns. Check it out:

Out: Worrying about 2020
In: 2020

Out: Caucuses
In: Primaries

Out: Concern about DREs
In: Concern about BMDs

Out: Concern about foreign interference in the 2016 elections
In: Concern about foreign interference in 2020 elections

Out: Any kind of machine readable bar or QR code on a ballot
In: Reliance on humans to accurately tally election results

Out:Tabletop exercises for election officials
In: Tabletop exercises for everyone

Out: Vote by mail
In: Vote at Home

Out: Excuse-required absentee voting
In: Vote at home for everyone

Out: Paper voter registration form
In: Automatic voter registration

Out: That accessible voting system in the corner that’s not even set up
In: An option for an accessible ballot marking system for everyone

Out: Waiting for VSAP
In: A new voting system for 5.5M voters in Los Angeles County

Out: FEC quorum
In: EAC quorum

Out: Crosscheck
In: ERIC

Out: Address tables
In: Geographic Information Systems (GIS)

Out: Segregating the vote
In: Better voter access technology for all

Out: Scrutiny
In: Intense Scrutiny

Out: Inherent trust in election administrators and the processes/procedures
In: Erroneous belief (fueled by those with agendas or misinformation) that election administration is not unbiased.

Out: DHS
In: CISA

Out: Security preparations
In: Security examinations

Out: Wondering when Florida will join ERIC
In: Hey look – Florida joined ERIC!

Out: KY Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes and MS Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann
In: KY Secretary of State Michael Adams and MS Secretary of State Michael Watson

Out: Asking Congress for federal funding for election security
In: Asking Congress for federal funding for election administration

Out: “Why don’t people vote?”
In: “Holy smokes – have you seen these 2020 turnout projections?”

Out: Fights about voter registration
In: Fights about voter purges

Out: Congress trying to kill the EAC
In: Congress raising the EAC’s budget 50%

Out: Generic “I Voted” stickers
In: Custom “I Voted” stickers

Out: #DogsAtPollingStations as a purely UK phenomenon
In: #DogsAtPollingPlaces during the US 2020 cycle

Out: College students fighting voter ID
In: College students fighting to make sure school IDs qualify

Out: Academics as critics of election officials
In: Former academics as election officials (Natalie Adona, Thad Hall)

Out: Trusting social media
In: #WarOnPineapple

Out: Cars crashing into polling places
In: Who are we kidding? Be careful out there, folks

Out: Cybersecurity training
In: Cybersecurity assessments, standards, & guidelines. Oh My.

Out: VVSG 1.1
In: VVSG 2.0?

Out: Foreign interference by Russia
In: Foreign interference by authoritarian regimes

Out: Foreign interference in big elections
In: Foreign interference in any election

Out: Election offices shying away from the Web and social media
In: #TrustedInfo2020

Out: Voting in your parka
In: Voting in your house slippers

Out: Making a list and checking it twice
In: Casting your ballot and checking it twice

Out: Sliding into the DMs
In: Sliding a ballot into your mailbox

Out: Fights to reverse felon disenfranchisement
In: Fights to preserve felon re-enfranchisement

Out: The calm of 2019
In: The night terrors of 2020

Thanks as always for this list to electionline’s Mindy Moretti and her contributors Lori Augino, Michelle Bishop, Brian Corley, Jamie Chesser, Joshua M. Franklin, Rick Hasen, Ricky Hatch, David Kuennen, David Levine, Mindy Moretti, Tammy Patrick, Gretchen Reinemeyer and Whitney Quesenbery (and me). Happy New Year to everyone out there; here’s hoping 2020 is exciting only in good ways … stay tuned!

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