Easy Voting

[Badger]

I only wish the vote being cast stopped the hand fulls of junk mail I am still getting. . . I even had a guy knock on my door the other day. . . and he was very persistent.

I asked him to leave and he said he had a right to free speech and I said well not on my front porch! Go freely speak somewhere else. . . (My bad for getting the door but I was literally right next to it when he rang).

+1

 

[tmm99]

I voted via mail a couple of weeks ago. Absentee voting as I now live in Canada. I registered and then, like a week later, I received a hand-written letter (from the election office) reminding me to vote in time, which surprised me. I did vote right after that. A very easy process.

 

[imjustawarrior]

I voted yesterday. My state mails out ballots to everyone. I sat in my Lazy-Boy recliner and filled it out. My DW always just copies mine.

I then used the drop box at the Elks Lodge near Walmart when I went to do some shopping yesterday.

I'm really glad how easy my state makes voting.

 

[CO-guy]

I asked him to leave and he said he had a right to free speech and I said well not on my front porch!

If you order someone off your property and they refuse, that's trespassing.

Call the cops or take your shot.

 

[MichaelB]

Just a reminder, the thread is about voting, not campaigning.

 

[ncbill]

Early voting started end of last week here...packed by all accounts.

So I'll try my luck early next week.

 

[gwill1010]

I may be in the minority here, but voting shouldn't be easy. Kinda think you should have to show up on voting day, paper ballot, and dip your finger in ink. (I'm not quite here, but it wouldn't disappoint me)

 

[Calico]

I may be in the minority here, but voting shouldn't be easy. Kinda think you should have to show up on voting day, paper ballot, and dip your finger in ink. (I'm not quite here, but it wouldn't disappoint me)

Early voting, absentee voting, and mail-in voting democratize access to the polls.

If all voting had to occur in person, on just one single day, members of the following groups would find it difficult (if not impossible) to vote, which would mean disenfranchising a significant number of people across the political spectrum:

1. Elderly folks (or folks of any age, actually) who are too ill to travel to the polls, or otherwise immobile, or who lack transportation.

2. Parents who are juggling 2-3 jobs with raising children, and whose employers don't allow time off work for voting. I don't know many employers who do allow this.

3. Anyone who is traveling (often for work) away from their home precinct on election day.

4. Military serving overseas - they can't exactly show up in their home precinct on election day.

Let's face it: stuff happens in everyone's life sometimes. If you break your leg the day before election day, or your baby is born on election day, or you have to attend your parent's funeral on election day, or you are hospitalized, or there's a blizzard (or, I don't know.....a hurricane.....hmmm?) on election day, without early voting you would be penalized and not be able to vote.

I am so grateful for early voting, and absentee voting, and mail-in voting.

It means my aunt and uncle, who are in their late-80's, and no longer drive, can arrange for transportation (me!) to early voting on a day when they feel well enough to leave their home.

It means my young co-worker. who was working night and day (as was her husband) while raising two children, had more than one option of a day to vote.

It means another young co-worker of mine was able to vote while serving in Iraq years ago.

It means that the people in western North Carolina (my state) have options for voting in the wake of Helene. They are simply trying to survive, and get some semblance of "normal" back in their lives, and election officials are working hard to adapt the voting process to make sure that everyone's voice can be heard.

Edited to add: I'm retired, and I have all the time in the world, so I could easily show up on election day (barring unforeseen acts of Nature, etc) but not everyone has that luxury.

 

[tulak]

Personally, I’m always surprised when I see lines for voting in other states. I enjoyed voting in person, and it makes me feel nostalgic, but voting by mail is so much easier.

Now I get my ballot in the mail two weeks prior to the election. I can spend an evening, usually with family, researching and voting, along with discussion about candidates or initiatives on the ballot.

Afterwards, I walk to the drop box to drop off my ballot. We can also mail it, no stamp required anymore, but the drop box is easy enough.

And every election I wonder, why can’t we all vote this way?

 

[Midpack]

Now I get my ballot in the mail two weeks prior to the election. I can spend an evening, usually with family, researching and voting, along with discussion about candidates or initiatives on the ballot.

And every election I wonder, why can’t we all vote this way?

• Eight states and Washington, D.C., allow all elections to be conducted entirely by mail: California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Vermont and Washington state.
• Two states permit counties to opt into conducting elections by mail: Nebraska and North Dakota.
• Nine states allow specific small elections to be conducted by mail: Alaska, Arizona, Florida, Kansas, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, New Mexico and Wyoming.
• Four states permit mostly mail elections for certain small jurisdictions: Idaho, Minnesota, New Jersey and New Mexico.

Table 18: States With All-Mail Elections

These tables are part of the Voting Outside the Polling Place report and shows which states have all-mail ballot elections.

www.ncsl.org

 

[wrigley]

I vote in person and will continue to do so until I physically can't. Early voting can last up to 30 days prior to an election. I can always find the time to pop in and cast my vote. Just my 2 cents!

Mike

 

[Dtail]

I may be in the minority here, but voting shouldn't be easy. Kinda think you should have to show up on voting day, paper ballot, and dip your finger in ink. (I'm not quite here, but it wouldn't disappoint me)

Yes you are in the minority. It is 2024.

 

[Calico]

During early voting, I may vote in any precinct. Before I retired in 2020, I always voted at the Senior Center, which was conveniently located 10 minutes from my workplace, so it was easy to pop over there on my lunch hour.

This year the library branch I visit at least once a week is an early voting location for the first time, so I will vote there this Sunday, when I return a book that is due that day. Easy peasy.

I did vote yesterday afternoon at the library, as planned. From the moment I got in line to vote, to the moment I pulled out of the parking lot to go on to my next errand, it only took 25 minutes. I had printed out a sample ballot earlier in the week, so I knew whom and what I was voting for, which also saved time.

Apparently I timed it exactly right (just got lucky!) because the wait time for the rest of the day was much longer. They were so efficient that I plan to make the library my new go-to location for early voting from now on.

I'm glad I could check that off my to-do list!

 

[Car-Guy]

Just thinking out loud, but how hard would it really be to tie voting "especially presidential level elections" to our social security system/accounts. I mean by the time we are of voting age, don't all US citizens have SS accounts anyway? And it's under government control and has good enough security to manage our old age benefits. Just add a "voting tab" on our accounts and we are off. Eliminates all the various rules/methods/options of each state. Sure some exceptions would be needed (hopefully few) and work would need to done on the SS service web application. But on the surface, it should make it easy to vote anywhere and reasonably secure/accurate, etc. They could "flag" folks that aren't eligible for one reason or another too.

Only real downside I can think of (I'm sure there are others) is the possible loss of anonymity. But anyone that knows me, knows how I'm going to vote anyway. And I don't care if they do!

 

[braumeister]

Only real downside I can think of is the possible loss of anonymity. But anyone that knows me, knows how I'm going to vote anyway. And I don't care if they do!

That is a very big downside.

 

[Car-Guy]

Afraid big brother is watching!

 

[tulak]

Voting is per state, not federal, and I suspect state rights would be a difficult obstacle to overcome.

 

[Gumby]

We voted early today for the first time. It worked just like regular voting here - you go the the gymnasium at the town hall, go to the proper check-in table for your street, show your ID, get your name crossed off the list, get your ballot, go to the little carrell to mark it and then turn it in.

The only difference is that when we got our actual ballot, we also showed ID again and got an envelope with a printed out sticker on it with our name and address. After we marked our ballots, we put them in the envelope, signed and dated and sealed it. Then we put the envelope in a locked ballot box. For normal voting, we don't get the envelope and just feed our marked ballot into the electronic scanner ourselves (they also keep the paper ballots in case something goes wrong with the scanner.)

From my observation, it was a very organized and secure. And it was certainly convenient to do it now instead of facing larger crowds on election day (when we'll be in Japan, anyway). It seemed to be mostly older retired people like the young wife and me. Hopefully, this will make voting less of a hassle for working people.

 

[Car-Guy]

Just got back from early voting. Took about a hour. We've lived here for ~15 years and it was the longest line we ever had here, by far.

 

[Ian S]

We'll get our ballots in tomorrow. Once they are tabulated, the volume of phone calls and junk mail should diminish substantially.

 

[Trailwalker]

First day that we could early vote. Got there five minutes after the clerk's office opened. No line. Five minutes in and out. Filled out ballot goes into an envelope that I sealed. Then I had to take the sealed envelope to the clerk, sign it in the clerk's presence and then he had to sign it as a witness to my signature, and away it went. I'll be out of the country during election week, but I prefer to early vote anyway to save time and avoid crowds.

 

[Koolau]

Apparently since we had our mail forwarded, they canceled our voter registration! Say what?

Not a big deal to register, but why cancel it? Just wait until we return, call and then resend. But, no. I guess they assumed we moved or some such.

Maybe that's a good sign.

 

[VanWinkle]

We voted yesterday with the first day of early voting at a church near our home. It took about 35 minutes in line to vote and they were very good at making sure of each person's identity.

 

[harllee]

My closest early voting site has now been opened a week and the lines are still very long and it is taking 2-3 hours to vote. Maybe they need more voting sites?

 

[pb4uski]

We early voted yesterday. About 30 minutes at the polling place. Line of about 50 people but it went quickly. Easy peasy.

It makes much more sense to have a reasonable period of time that people can vote rather than crushing it all into one day with really long lines that discourage participation.