What to know about mail in voting as millions of voters opt for paper ballots

Voting by mail has steadily become a more popular option for Americans to cast their ballot, however, it has come under attack with baseless accusations of fraud and mistrust.

And in recent days they have come under literal fire from suspected perpetrators.

But despite these threats, election officials and law enforcement have worked rigorously to ensure that those ballots are not only delivered and counted on time but also free from any type of fraud.

As of Tuesday, over 25.6 million Americans have returned a mail ballot and over 65 million Americans, including military members abroad, have requested an absentee ballot according to data from Election Lab at the University of Florida.

At the end of the 2020 election over 65 million votes were cast through the mail, however, experts noted that because of the pandemic, more voters chose this method.

In the last two elections, former President Donald Trump has cast doubt on voting by mail, contending that mail ballots aren’t secure enough.

There has been no evidence to back his claims, which have been refuted by several courts, election offices, audits and other security checks in several elections.

Several studies have shown that fraud in mail ballot voting is rare, and in those few instances, the perpetrator was punished, and the votes were never counted.

One such instance took place in North Carolina in the 2018 midterms when Leslie McCrae Dowless, a political operative working for Republican House candidate Mark Harris “defrauded voters by collecting unfilled ballots and then filling in the rest of it to favor the campaign’s candidate,” according to a report from MIT’s Election Lab.

As a result of the incident, a new election was held, and Dowless was convicted of fraud in 2020.

“Even many scholars who argue that fraud is generally rare agree that fraud with [vote by mail] voting seems to be more frequent than with in-person voting,” researchers at the MIT Election Lab said in a report.

This year is no different when it comes to ensuring those votes are delivered and counted on time and accurately.

The first line of security occurs at the election office.

Forty-two states require voters who vote by mail to apply for the absentee ballot, and those approval processes are thorough, according to the Brennan Center for Justice, a non-profit public policy institute.

“Election workers compare the request to the voter’s registration record to ensure each ballot is sent to the correct voter and that only one ballot is sent to each voter,” the non-profit wrote in a report.

The remaining eight states and the District of Columbia mail ballots to all registered voters and allow them the option of submitting the ballot or voting in person.

“Frequent mailings help keep voter registration records up to date so that ballots are sent to eligible voters at their current address,” the Brennan Center said.

When voters cast their ballot and send it in the mail, there are more checks.

Ballots are sent in envelopes with unique tracking codes and barcodes that allow them to be tracked by officials. Several states allow voters to track their ballots as well.

The U.S. Postal Service is required by law to prioritize delivering election-related mail and has undertaken “extraordinary measures,” to get the deliveries through. That includes extra deliveries and collections, special pickups, specialized sort plans at processing facilities to expedite delivery to boards of elections, and local handling and transportation of ballots, according to the agency.

The USPS said 99.9% of ballots were delivered within a week in 2020 and 98.3% were delivered within three days.

The USPS’s law enforcement division examines mail fraud, including if a letter or package has been tampered with, and investigates any suspected case.

Additionally, many states offer voters the option of turning in their absentee ballot in person to either an election office, approved ballot box or early voting polling site.

All mail ballots require at least one signature, with some, like Pennsylvania, requiring one on the envelope as well. The majority of state election offices, 31, use a signature verification system in which election workers inspect the signature through multiple records.

“Some officials receive training that law enforcement uses to detect forgeries. If election workers are uncertain about whether the signatures match, multiple states require ballots to be sent to a bipartisan team for a second review,” the Brennan Center said.

The Brennan Center stressed that the teams are made up of an equal number of Republican and Democratic workers.

If an error is detected, election officials in 24 states are required to notify the voter about the error and allow them to rectify the error by Election Day.

Pennsylvania does not have a statewide requirement to cure erroneous mail ballots, however, a 2022 court decision permitted county election departments the ability to correct those errors.