Hundreds of Pennsylvania voters are challenged based on postal service's change-of-address database
Source: AP
Updated 3:42 PM EDT, October 29, 2024
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Counties in Philadelphia’s suburbs are being asked to throw out the mail-in ballot applications of hundreds of voters in what the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania said are mass-produced and illegal challenges. The challenges question the voter’s residence based on a supposed match with a U.S. Postal Service change-of-address database.
Diane Houser, a supporter of former President Donald Trump who filed over 200 of the challenges in Chester County, said the challenges are nonpartisan and from a grassroots network targeting the ballot applications of people who moved out of state.
However, the ACLU said the challenges are illegal because voters can only be challenged on their qualifications to register to vote. Friday is the deadline for such challenges, which the ACLU said must be based on specific evidence that a certain would-be voter is not eligible to vote.
The challenges are based on a faulty premise that someone is moving out-of-state permanently because the change-of-address forms are also designed to help someone get their mail forwarded, the ACLU said. Someone in the database may be temporarily relocating for school, military service or other purposes, as opposed to permanently changing their residence, the ACLU wrote in a letter to counties.
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/pennsylvania-mail-ballot-application-voter-eligibility-9d9631c2f1474c40535b5ee05bb07099
= new reply since forum marked as read
Posted on: October 7, 2024
The Philadelphia Board of Elections has received mail-in and absentee ballots with various issues that may prevent them from being counted in the upcoming November 5, 2024 General Election. These issues include:
Unverifiable Identification: Mail ballots from voters whose identification could not be verified. Voters who have not submitted acceptable proof of ID or whose ID could not be verified should fill out the ID verification form, and submit it along with a photocopy or picture of an acceptable ID (if available) to phillyelection@phila.gov or via fax to (215) 686-3398 by Tuesday, November 12, 2024. Without this information, the Board cannot count your ballot. Undeliverable or Potentially Flawed: Ballots returned by the U.S. Postal Service as “undeliverable”, or administratively determined to be potentially flawed. Flaws may include lacking a signature on the declaration envelope, lacking a written date on the declaration envelope, lacking a secrecy envelope, or having a potentially incorrect date. These ballot submissions have the possibility of NOT being counted.
https://vote.phila.gov/media/2024_General_Election_Deficiency_List.pdf
I pulled up the spreadsheet for today's list for a what the hell check and found this count -
No date = 227
No secrecy envelope ( "naked ballot" ) = 285
No signature (on outer envelope) = 730
Potential date problem = 159
Undeliverable = 1296
The envelopes that were sent with the packet here in Philly actually had the year "2024" already pre-filled so the voter only needed to fill in the MM DD part (which would help thwart people putting birthdates in).
As to this -
If someone didn't reapply for the mail ballot, then they shouldn't have been automatically sent one. I know there are 2 options in the application - either get a mail ballot ONLY for the upcoming election -OR- get a mail ballot for ALL elections for that single year (primary, special, general). The database has the person's registered (for voting purposes) address BUT the application gives the option to SEND the ballot to a DIFFERENT address and it might be that the "different" address (say if the person is in college out of state and wants to vote from there but still has an "official" residence at their voter registered address), then that could have been an issue for "undeliverable" if that address had errors in it. I know I voted for 4 years while I was out of state in college but then that was WAY before there were any "online" applications for an absentee ballot. It was all the snail mail application.
