A new piece in Belt Magazine maps out challenges facing the national call for expanding vote by mail. EVIC’s Director, Dr. Gronke notes the transition is a challenge akin to moving from “Walmart to Amazon” in short period of time. Along with other election administration scholars, this piece surveys the questions election administrators face. Read more here: “Democracy by Mail.”
I’m following news coverage of the first election with early voting in New York State. I’ve been studying early voting for over fifteen years, and have dealt with a lot of journalists over time. It’s a learning experience for journalists new to the early voting “beat.”
One pattern that we see in almost every state is that older voters gravitate toward early voting (though this pattern typically changes as the system matures, as voters and campaigns adapt to early voting).
But otherwise, these first patterns are always fascinating. The linked story is from Erie County, NY does a nice job unpacking why elderly voters are so heavily represented among the early vote.
First, it looks like most early voting centers were places in senior citizen homes and community centers. And voter response is predictably high among those who frequent these locations.
Second, it’s a low profile election, and these are typically dominated by frequent voters, and elderly voters are far more likely to be frequent voters.
Good job, Buffalo NPR, WBFO!
Hot off the presses! https://www.brennancenter.org/publication/avr-impact-state-voter-registration
California Secretary of State Alex Padilla has a new mantra for California voters: “no stamp, no problem.”
That’s great for equity and voter access, but it will be fascinating to see how this changes voter behavior. In California, voters may choose to return ballots to a local precinct place or the county office, in addition to using the mail. How many will continue to use these options when postage is provided? It will be interesting to see how many do so in the next few election cycles, and how this alters ballot processing across the state.
Early Voting Rates in Texas’s 30 Largest Counties Approaching 200% of 2014 Totals
I’ve resisted posting much about early voting totals, but hat tip to Michael McDonald, Dan Smith, and others: these totals are astounding.
Thanks to Paul Manson and the students in Political Science 377 who worked with me on the graphic.
New story in the Washington Post about which states may not have finalized returns on election night. Skip the No Doz go to sleep and wait until morning (or later)!
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/politics/voting-quirks/
Very interesting work by Jean Schroedel and Melissa Rogers on the difficulties faced by Native Americans living on reservations and who wish to cast a ballot.
Their study found that voting by mail, seemingly a solution to the transportation problems faced by residents on reservations, may not work as well as we might assume because of distrust of mail balloting.
This is a portion of the population that faces many significant barriers to voting. Tova Wang documented many of these barriers in a report issued by Demos nearly a decade ago, and things don’t seem to have improved.
