[Epoch Times September 18, 2021](Reported by Epoch Times reporter Li Meicheng County) Mailed ballots came because of the Chinese Communist virus (COVID-19), but will they be cancelled as the epidemic weakens and is brought under control? Not yet known.
On May 8, 2020, California Governor Gavin Newsom announced his 38th executive order under a state of emergency, mandating an absentee voting (All Absentee Election, or mail-in ballot) for the November general election last year. It was the first state in the U.S. to use mail-in ballots to vote, and it has since spread across all states.
In February 2021, Newsom announced that all elections at the end of the year will use mailed ballots, and will send ballots to every voter according to the data from the California Voter Database. Like the recall election on September 14, counties send ballots based on the data in the state database.
Mailing ballots is convenient for voters
During the epidemic, mailed ballots can be filled out at home, which is believed to reduce the probability of people being infected. Although the government has paid for the postage, most people still don’t want to use the postal method. Instead, they cast the envelopes in the ballot boxes on the roadsides or in the ballot boxes in the polling center.
Because of the use of mail-in ballots, the election time has been lengthened. Like this recall election, the election office will send the ballots from August 16th to the deadline for voting on September 14th, and there will be one month of voting time; the counting of votes will be collected from August 16th to the end of verification on October 22nd. It took nearly two months.
Disadvantages of mailed ballots
Many people feel that sending ballots to the polling center has reduced the number of steps and is more assured. However, the paper size and quality of the mailed ballots are different from those of the regular ballots, and polling centers in various regions cannot be directly scanned and included in the system.
The mailing of ballots not only extends the election time, but also increases the processing steps and processes. At the Orange County Voting Center, mailing ballots requires shipping, registration and stamping, ballot classification, opening the envelope to take out the ballots, and someone to scan into the machine, verify the signature, and copy manually (for example, if your options are not filled with boxes, etc., The staff needs to manually draw on the official ballot according to your ballot), and then send it to scan, check the envelope, etc. All paper documents will be kept for two years.
In the polling center, although people cannot be required to show their citizenship, ID registration is still required. Now it is online registration, and it is impossible to see who voted by mail. The Orange County Voting Center verifies whether it is the voter by comparing the signature on the envelope with the record, and allows residents to “watch” the vote counting process as observers.
An observer said that mailing ballots adds a lot of manual processing, allowing others to access your ballots before your ballots are counted in the system, and the processing process increases the risk. In many counties in California, the calculations The ticket center is not open to residents.
The recall election cost a lot of money. According to the Los Angeles Times, the cost of the recall election may reach 300 million U.S. dollars. The election process is too long (too long), the employment of labor and the use of venues all increase the cost of normal elections. .
Is the data in California’s voter register accurate? Is it updated to include voters who have moved out of California, passed away, or are ineligible?
Linda Paine, president of the Election Integrity Project California (EPICa), said at a meeting this year: “When we filed a lawsuit in 2017, 11 counties had registered voter turnout rates that exceeded 100%. ; In 2020, the voter turnout rate in 23 counties will exceed 100%.”
Regardless of last year’s general election or this year’s special election to recall, some voters did not receive mailed ballots (not in the voter database), or newly registered ballots or voters with inconsistent information can go to the polling center to use provisional ballots to vote. California’s election law does not allow workers to require registrants to show proof of their citizenship, which would be considered discrimination. In California, many people are registered as voters when they get a driver’s license, and they are not necessarily all citizens.
Paine pointed out: “In 2012, California used 40% of the nation’s provisional votes; in the 2016 presidential election, California’s provisional votes accounted for 60% of the nation.” People who use provisional votes will be counted in the voter database and used next time. .
In response to the problems in the general election, the California Election Integrity Project submitted its findings to the Secretary of State on June 22 and raised questions, including: Why did California have 1.8 million more registered voters than eligible citizens in the general election last year? Comparing the data of February 2021 and March 2020, the number of unqualified voters increased by 72% (about 700,000 people); why the California online and DMV registration system changed 33,000 foreign-born voters to California or American , Changing the 76,000 voters born in other states to being born in California. ◇
Editor in charge: Li Xin
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