Vote By Mail: A Pragmatic Response to a National Election Hit by COVID-19
Editor’s Note: OSET Institute’s Global Director of Technology & Standards Eddie Perez, in collaboration with the Institute’s COO, Gregory Miller and General Counsel Christine Santoro, developed this article in response to requests from our stakeholder community. This article is a companion to commentary posted by OSET Institute CTO John Sebes on our TrustTheVote Project’s blog.
As the U.S. battles the spread of COVID-19, expanded Vote-by-Mail is a feasible method and a pragmatic approach to help protect the operational continuity of democracy administration and to avoid dangerous disruptions to constitutionally mandated national elections.
Context
Given the rapid expansion of the COVID-19 outbreak, the likelihood it will impact the national election in less than 235 days, and the many discussions underway in many venues about how to protect the health of voters, we believe discussing alternative processes and platform of election administration is urgent given the time frame. So, the agenda of this article is threefold:
Overview the mechanics of a Vote-by-Mail (VBM) implementation;
Make the following points:
The mechanics of implementing vote-by-mail programs for more voters—especially in response to a national public health crisis are feasible;
The implementation should not be prohibitively viewed as “reinventing the wheel” for election officials, when in fact, many tasks associated with broad-based vote-by-mail voting have already been implemented in every state to support absentee voting (albeit on a smaller scale).
Accordingly, this should be thought of as expanding the scope of what election officials are already doing.
To propose that given the feasibility of modified policies and procedures to expand access to Vote-by-Mail, and given the current availability of technology to support it, expanded VBM for all registered voters for the 2020 November federal election should be seriously considered as an effective measure to mitigate risks associated with the Coronavirus outbreak, which has been deemed a global pandemic.
Vote-by-Mail or “VBM” is an appropriate, health-conscious response to public health risks associated with what will most likely be unusually crowded polling places.
Equally important in terms of context, this article is not a comprehensive description of how to operationalize and implement a Vote-by-Mail program. There are other thought-leaders and pioneers, such as the National Vote at Home Institute and the State of Oregon (which currently conducts all-by-mail elections), that provide detailed resources to assist policy makers and election officials in implementing such programs, and this article is informed by their excellent work.
Two great starting points are available here:
Vote by Mail Procedures Manual (Oregon Secretary of State, Elections Division)
What is Vote by Mail?
Given recent dialogue about expanding “Vote-by-Mail,” what exactly are we talking about? For the OSET Institute, in the context of current events, we’re viewing it as expanded access to paper ballots currently supported by the states’ existing Absentee ballot procedures. And to that extent its not inventing anything new; the processes and platforms of VBM are well established. This is more about extending the policy of VBM.
So, importantly, the first point is that the receipt and return of a ballot by mail is not “reinventing the wheel;” indeed, every state already provides at least some form of by-mail voting for Absentee voters. Thus, the mechanics of verifying registration, preparing ballot packets for outgoing mail, receiving marked ballots from voters, verifying signatures, and scanning and tabulating ballots are already being done in every state.
Expanded access to VBM requires rapid scaling to handle a larger volume of ballots sent and received through the mail. Clearly “scaling” requires time, planning, and resources; we do not diminish or downplay those concerns. However, the additional resources are a tractable problem, and what is being proposed in discussions (or even legislation) about expanding VBM does not in our professional opinion create dependency on completely unfamiliar, never-contemplated workflows.
At the most robust initiative, expanding VBM is essentially moving away from “excuse required” Absentee voting (which by definition is a limited pool of voters) to “no excuse required” by-mail voting for any active voter. Then, in furtherance of the cost and operational efficiencies, ballots would be distributed through the U.S. mails to all registered voters.
In keeping with best practices already implemented in several states that have successfully used all-by-mail voting for years, once voters have received their ballots in the mail, the remaining procedural matters to address include:
Producing U.S. postage-paid return envelopes.
Multiple drop-off locations for voters, as an additional option to postal return.
At the central processing facility, rigorous signature verification on each returned ballot attestation envelope, to ensure that ballots are returned only by registered voters.
Scanning and tabulation (already supported by currently available commercial voting systems).
Ideally, post-election audits.
Secure storage of voted by-mail ballots, after the election.
Furthermore, it’s essential to make provisions for remote accessible vote-by-mail (RAVBM) systems for voters with disabilities. Details and best practices for RAVBM systems are beyond the scope of this article, but here’s an excellent start, from the Center for Civic Design: Principles and guidelines for remote ballot marking systems.
Why does VBM make sense now, during the COVID-19 outbreak?
VBM is a feasible method to protect public health. Those states with restrictive Absentee policies and high dependencies on Election Day in-person polling place voting are precisely the same ones that have crowded polling places and long lines. So, the continued restriction of by-mail voting to limited numbers, which leads to busy polling places, can increase the risk of spreading the virus. Conversely, VBM provides important options for voters that reduce dependence on crowded in-person polling locations.
VBM technology is readily available and modular. Especially at a time when every penny is valuable for every County’s public health efforts, the ability to make an “incremental” transition to VBM is important. For most jurisdictions that have already implemented a commercial voting system from one of the major voting system vendors, they likely already have the needed capabilities as part of the “Absentee” processing system (or could easily add them to the existing voting system), and VBM would rely on fewer devices and personnel than in-person polling places.
VBM reduces technology vulnerabilities. Since VBM relies on a limited number of technology components (computers, high-speed scanners) located at a central election office, rather than relying, for example, on large numbers of vulnerable voting devices in various locations, the “attack surface” on the voting technology is reduced. And, VBM includes, of course, audit-able paper ballots.
VBM demonstrates resiliency and commitment to democracy even in the most challenging times that require a concerted national response. Expanding VBM to serve all active registered voters for the November 2020 Presidential Election is a pragmatic and necessary statement that America is resilient to any kind of national emergency, and this nation will be undeterred in protecting and preserving its constitutionally mandated administration and defense of democracy as a matter of national security.
How to “Operationalize” Expanded VBM – A Starter “Checklist”
As we’ve noted, many of the operational tasks associated with a broad-based VBM program may already be done on a smaller scale today, even for smaller counties. If the entire nation were to move to expanded VBM for November 2020, many counties would likely need support from state authorities to implement changes. However, it’s important to note that all of the tools (i.e., third-party printing and mail-house support; USPS guidance; voting system hardware and software) are available today.
The outline presented below provides a rough preview of the most relevant activities associated with VBM; for a view of more detailed procedures, we recommend the Oregon Secretary of State’s Vote by Mail Procedures Manual.
Printing and Assembling Ballots
Arrange with third-party printers to print larger quantities of ballots—one for every registered voter.
The election management systems (EMSs) from most commercial voting systems available today produce print-ready ballots in PDF format; accordingly, those digital files can be provided to third-party printers to support the production of all necessary ballot styles; election officials should advise their printer of possible ballot quantities, as well as specifications for ballot stock (i.e., dimensions, weight, grain, etc.)
Arrange with third-party mail houses to print more outgoing mail envelopes (for all voters) and to assemble packets to be mailed (including outgoing window envelopes; secrecy sleeves and return identification envelopes for incoming ballots; and indicia/barcode for postage-free/prepaid return postage).
Prepare supplementary voter education materials, or additional inserts.
Ensure that annual postal permit fees have been paid.
Have the US Postal Service review or help to design outgoing and return envelopes to ensure they meet the necessary postal standards for automated handling (See also: U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC), The Role of Design in the Vote-By-Mail Process: Envelopes Get Their Day in the Sun, with links to additional resources).
Contact your local postal representative to coordinate election mailings.
Processing Ballots
As incoming ballots are received, perform signature verification to ensure that returned ballots match those associated with voter registration records; flag those that need additional review.
Inspect all ballots to ensure that voter marks are machine-readable for automated processing.
Workers handling mail-in ballots should practice hand hygiene frequently.
If necessary, batch ballots by precinct (some voting systems require election officials to do this manually, before scanning; others do not require pre-sorting, which saves time)
Scan ballots.
Every major voting system available today (Election Systems & Software; Dominion Voting Systems; Hart InterCivic; Clear Ballot; and Unisyn) offers federally-certified batch-fed central-scanning capabilities with proprietary or commercial-off-the-shelf scanners, so options are available to the nation’s election officials (if they are not already using them today).
Because central scanning capabilities are typically integrated with a jurisdiction’s overall voting system capabilities, even if a jurisdiction is not currently using a vendor’s VBM solution (although many are for absentee processing), it’s likely that making the transition would require little more than the voting system vendor installing software on a new workstation, and providing the scanner(s) to go with it. Counties may need state and/or federal support for the licensing fees and costs associated with those incremental changes.
Tabulate ballots.
Ideally, conduct post-election audits.
Seal and store ballots in secure sealed containers, or in a locked secure ballot storage room.
Summary
For the OSET Institute, the bottom line is we believe expanded access to VBM is entirely do-able, and in light of the national emergency the President declared yesterday, a prudent and cost-effective response to ensure the impact of the global COVID-19 pandemic does not threaten our constitutionally mandated and protected requirement for national elections this year. Getting this done requires acknowledging four important points:
This will require national leadership comprised of a partnership of the states and federal government (for the resources to support this national emergency response).
There is good news that every state already has a foundation for what’s required to expand VBM to cover all registered voters.
Reducing risks of public transmission in busy polling locations is a critical public health objective and VBM supports that.
VBM sustains the normal democratic election processes, by ensuring that elections occur at regularly scheduled, legally-mandated times; in other words, VBM avoids the danger of letting a national emergency threaten our constitutionally mandated administration of democracy (which is something our enemies surely hope might happen).
Finally, while this article presents the important reasons why expanding VBM deserves serious consideration at this time, we emphasized that this model has its own complexities, and is not without its challenges before November 2020. Important issues such as legislative changes, USPS capacity, additional federal and state resources, security, chain of custody for paper ballots, and adequate support for voters with disabilities are just some of the matters that require additional attention.
Another important consideration is the need to address any state policies that currently prevent early scanning (without tabulation) of by-mail ballots before Election Day, so that election results can be released in timely fashion, even with a surge in by-mail ballots. For the reasons described herein, that’s why this essential work needs to start now.
As a nation, we’ve risen to epic challenges at important historical junctures, in order to protect our democracy. We can do it again.
Additional Resources