Ballot Harvesting: Problem That Needs A Solution Or A Solution That Needs A Problem?
A combine harvester in Bavaria. Photo by Reinhold Möller, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Here we go again, Maura is kicking the hornet’s nest on a controversial election topic. First it was Zombie Ballots, now Ballot Harvesting! Which side you’re on will greatly influence how you feel on this topic, and by side I mean, did your team win or lose? Much like Zombie Ballots, there are no reliable numbers on how many ballots are harvested in any particular election, or how many are improperly handled.
The Election Assistance Commission defines Ballot Harvesting thusly:
The act of collecting ballots, typically by a political party or nonprofit organization, for multiple voters and returning those ballots to an elections office on behalf of those voters. The legality of this practice varies by state, with some states allowing the practice, limiting who can return ballots on behalf of others or banning the practice completely.
Now that we know the official definition, we can see in the first sentence where the problems lie, “typically by a political party or nonprofit organization.” This one sentence is where we get the first issues because it shows where the abuse can enter. Now the other issue is “for multiple voters and returning those ballots to an elections office on behalf of those voters.” The two parts of this sentence create the idea that just about anyone could get a list of mail-in ballots, go forth, assist impaired voters, and return a massive bin of votes. Two things come from this; one is that the idea is fantastic as this allows impaired voters a chance to be heard. The dark side (insert spooky music) is the insinuation that the groups and political parties only return ballots that favor their cause. Knowing human nature, I am sure we can all see where this line of thinking comes in. The answers to this “issue” remind me of this by Genya Coulter:
Sometimes neither side has the most realistic expectations. No matter how much we communicate, there is always going to be a gap because we don’t always understand how each group must order their priorities. And what seems realistic to one group is like expecting the other group to believe in magical ballot fairies.
Is there a problem? That depends on who you ask, but apparently seven different states felt there was and they sought to correct the issue:
- Arizona: Banned the practice in 2016 with a carve out for family members to handle each other’s ballots.
- California: Relaxed its rules just before the 2018 mid-terms and many speculate that it changed the outcome of more than one race. The Los Angeles Times editorial board rejected the speculation but did say it “does open the door to coercion and fraud.”
- Colorado: You can not collect more than ten ballots unless you are a designated elections official.
- Georgia: Limits ballot return to the elector, relative, or person living in the same household.
- Montana: A voter initiative passed in 2018 limits a collector to six ballots.
- North Carolina: Only the elector or immediate family member can return a ballot.
- Texas: Only the elector can handle their ballot (from what I have seen this is the strictest law.)
Some of these states are very Democrat and some are very Republican and a few swing between them, so it is obvious that neither side truly trusts the other on this issue. As to fraudulent collections, there is a precedent for that and, some could say, proof it happens.
According to the indictment, Dowless “unlawfully, willfully, and feloniously” submitted absentee ballots and concealed that they were not sent by voters.
Now, if you combine ballot harvesting with Zombies you could have a perfect storm to sway a district, but remember I said could. However, the two issues do go together as far as public trust in our election system is concerned. Both issues are the butt of jokes and memes at every major election, and memes — much like any form of propaganda — do influence the way we look at issues.
Am I looking at a solution that needs a problem or a problem that needs a solution? Yes, but we owe it to ourselves and future generations to close every security hole we have in our election system to both further public trust and ensure fair elections.
I see no reason the practice should ever be allowed outside of narrow accommodations for citizens with physical disabilities.Report
Indian Reservations. They generally lack physical addresses and thus don’t receive mail in their dwellings.Report
Simple Fix, A community can designate a person or persons to collect ballots for that community, and that person is made known to election officials.
So a reservation, or an assisted living facility, or any community, can say “we trust these people to help us”, and those people take on the duty to help.Report
Yea, this is not an impossible logistical issue. It can be done without resorting to person shows up with bag of ballots from the reservation.Report
Well, a random person showing up with a bag of ballots, anyway.
Another thing we can use is tamper proof envelopes. If you are not going to the polling place to hand your ballot to an election official, you should get, or be able to get, a tamper proof envelope to put your ballot in. Heck, have the community designate run around with a box of them, so anyone who wants one can ask them for it when they pick up the ballot.Report
When I have voted absentee in Mississippi I have had to get my outer envelope notarized ACROSS the flap after I seal it. That’s about as tamperproof as you can get.Report
I can think of a half dozen ways of making an envelope tamper-proof that don’t involve having another human on hand.Report
According to the election officials in Colorado, the current envelopes are almost impossible to open and reseal without it being obvious.
The illegal large-scale harvesting schemes that have been proposed all depend on getting the ballot and envelope before they’ve been sealed.Report
Which means that the real danger of ballot harvesting is not fraudulent votes as much as destroyed votes. Again, why I prefer mail in. After I send my ballot, I can use the control number to verify my ballot was received and counted.Report
I must again take issue with your characterization that no one really knows the number of “Zombie” ballots. I did this work for DOJ for a number of years, and continue to do work for private clients regarding voting. There is scant evidence of “Zombie” ballots being anything other than a very, very, very tiny number. To say we don’t know gives cover to conspiracy theorists. We do. Its practically nil.
“Now, if you combine ballot harvesting with Zombies you could have a perfect storm to sway a district, but remember I said could.”—This line is wholly irresponsible… We know that zombie voters are not a problem, from the data. Author admits she has no idea about ballot harvesting being a problem. Yet this language again, gives cover to election conspiracy theorists who undermine our democracy.Report
Posts like these are part of what drives distrust in elections. They are at best disinformation campaigns brought forth by well meaning but naive authors.Report
Naive is one possibility.
That someone can be fixated on a minor technical issue, on very nearly the same day that it is revealed that America came within one person away from a coup, is…interesting as some might say.Report
In 2010 there was a big broo haha about dead voters in South Carolina.
The result you can read here from their commission. The South Carolina DMV had said that 953 dead voters had voted in elections between 2005 and 2010. In actuality, there’s evidence that 1 did.
One, out of millions and millions of votes cast.
https://www.scvotes.gov/node/222Report
In terms of ballot harvesting, this is a loaded hyper partisan term . Most states allow certain individuals — especially family members, health-care providers, and legal guardians — to assist voters by collecting and submitting their absentee ballots. Many states allow a broader array of individuals to provide ballot assistance. Where allowed, ballot collection is not indicative of any malfeasance or fraud.
Further, there is no evidence of a correlation between allowing legal ballot collection and ballot tampering
ballot tampering scandals are not more common in states that allow ballot collection. The last big ballot tampering scandal was in NC, and was caught fairly easy by official there, in other words, the safeguards NC had in place already work.
Succinctly, we should not be focused on this as a boogeyman.Report
Presidents trying to overthrow elections: A problem seeking a solution, or a solution seeking a problem? In this Ohio diner, it could go either way.Report
Until you and others can provide concrete statistics that 1) zombie ballots and 2) ballot harvesting have had an impact on any actual election, I’ll invite you to stop this nonsense. You can’t close every loophole, but as even the Cyber Ninjas have to admit today – after conning untold millions from gullible Americans – the most recent election was free, fair, and secure. Posts like this are irresponsible at best, and part of the disinformation campaign that is slowly eroding democracy.
Frankly I expect better of our editors regarding these issues too.Report
Tangentially related, the Arizona cyberninjas report that Biden carried Arizona by 360 more votes than officially reported. Given the comically careless way they proceeded, I have no confidence that their numbers are any better than the official numbers, but the sheer insignificance of the discrepancy is telling.Report
You can glean all you need to know about that effort that they intended to drop their report on a Friday.Report
Indeed. I’ve been saying for some time now that the Ninjas’ best hope is to publish a report that confirms the counts and says there’s no evidence of improper or illegal ballots being cast, and then disappear into the night. They’re already in enough trouble in terms of criminal and civil lawsuits.Report
These are numbers that are accounted for by the edge cases: ballots that are provisional, damaged, badly marked, etc, and depended on human judgement rather than mechanical counting. The Cyber Ninjas are behind the times — that’s what happens when you get contractually roped into having to actually count a couple million paper ballots. The rest of the conspiracy folks acknowledged that the machines count ballots accurately months ago. Now the theories are that thousands/millions of illegally cast ballots were somehow introduced into the stream to be counted. I look forward to what the Ninjas have to say on that topic this afternoon.Report
I should add, it is totally unsurprising that the counts of those ballots requiring a human decision would be different. The county’s process involves written guidelines for what counts, people from both major parties making a joint decision, and if they disagree, a procedure for escalation. The Ninjas, so far as we can tell, made up a process as they went along. The AZ supreme court has ruled that they will eventually have to disclose their procedures.Report
Ok, let’s run down how mail-in balloting works in CA. You get a ballot, which is machine readable. The ballot and the envelope both have a serial number. You sign the ballot across the seal (no notarization). If someone else handles it to drop it off, THEY must sign on the envelope, too.
Meanwhile, you can go to the county website and ask for a text notification that they got your ballot.
So most ways of cheating at any scale run into problems. If you simply make ballots, you risk making invalid or overlapping serial numbers. If you decline to turn in a ballot, the user won’t get a text notification and wonder what’s up. The state knows to whom it sent each serial number, so presenting ID isn’t really an issue. Yeah, someone could steal your ballot out of your mailbox and attempt to use it, but if you notice this and request a replacement, the old serial number is invalidated, and will probably trigger an investigation of some sort.
That said, I’d be happy to adopt, for instance, the Colorado law. Vote-by-mail, in and of itself, solves so many of the disability/scheduling issues, that I don’t think it’s a big deal. Of course, it hasn’t been a big deal, as so many other commenters have been quick to point out.Report
How do they ensure privacy if the ballot serial number is associated with a specific voter? Removable stub as part of the early processing?Report
Mississippi uses two envelopes for its absentee ballots. The outer one gets the voter information. The inner one not. I would think Colorado does the same.Report
Doctor Jay’s comment certainly suggests that a specific ballot can be tied to a specific voter: ” The ballot and the envelope both have a serial number… someone could steal your ballot out of your mailbox and attempt to use it, but if you notice this and request a replacement, the old serial number is invalidated…” Maybe he meant the return envelope is invalidated, which is what would happen in Colorado, but that’s not what he wrote.Report
“The state knows to whom it sent each serial number…”
This is probably not actually true. The state knows which control numbers were sent and likely to what zip code, maybe what neighborhood, but the control number is not tied to an individual or a specific location. When I check the SOS website to verify my ballot was received, I give them the number and I get a yea or nay that they got it, and that’s it.Report
Texas: Anyone who assists another person in voting can be sued for $10,000.Report