Archive for May 2020

Texas’ Attorney General is asking the state Supreme Court to halt counties’ expanded use of absentee balloting due to coronavirus concerns for the upcoming run-off elections.

Election offices across the country facing increased demand for mail ballots are searching for help to process the mountain of requests and ballots from voters – and in Chesapeake, VA that help is coming from staff at the local library.

Four federal agencies have sent states a memo expressing concerns about the security risks associated with electronic ballot return systems some states are planning to use in 2020.

California’s Governor announced last Friday that voters will all be mailed ballots for the November election, making it the largest state so far to shift to vote-by-mail for 2020. It will require confronting policy and fiscal challenges – and require aggressive voter outreach – in order to work in November.

A new study by the Federal Voting Assistance Program examines state UOCAVA websites and finds that while all but a few can be quickly located and contain the majority of the information voters need, most can improve their readability and ease of use by voters.

A federal judge signaled yesterday that he intends to rule against Florida in a lawsuit over voting rights for individuals with former felony convictions, setting up both a rush to register these voters and a likely appeal.

A federal judge yesterday reversed a decision by the New York State Board of Elections to essentially cancel the Democratic presidential primary, ordering it to proceed as scheduled on June 23.

Oklahoma’s Supreme Court ruled yesterday that the state cannot enforce its requirement that mail ballots be notarized in order to be counted, handing a victory to opponents of the law who claimed it will interfere with voters’ ability to cast ballots during the COVID-19 pandemic.

States and localities are racing to ramp up their vote-by-mail programs this year in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic – and the nation’s ballot printers are racing right alongside them. In fact, the debate over VBM could soon run aground on a lack of capacity to print, prepare and mail those ballots to voters nationwide.

A new report looks at election costs and finds that state and local election officials will fall way short of the cash they need to conduct the 2020 election. It’s the latest indication that the nation’s normal practice of underfunding election administration is going to be even more painful than usual this year.