I voted yesterday... No Political statements just asking about the method you chose on casting your ballot.

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

In KS at least it can be continuous. Early voting starts on October 14th (general time frame is 20 days before election day) and runs until November 2nd 12pm/noon. It's up to each county for when they start and stop and the hours and locations. All counties have to have advanced voting open by no later than 1 week before the election.

Speaking only about my county--- this year 3 additional advanced voting locations were added (total of 10) and began on October 17th (additional drop boxes were added as well for mailed ballots). No polling location is open on a Sunday. The hours vary by location and day but run typical from 9am-3pm or 10am-7pm. The only advanced voting place open on November 2nd is the county election office (open 8am-12pm/noon). On November election day itself this year at least 170 locations (IIRC) in my county alone will be available to voters.

 

[mrodgers]

PA has "early voting" in that you can fill in your ballot and physically walk it to a ballot dropbox, which is what some other states are doing. I've seen this called "early in-person voting" on the state website: https://www.pa.gov/guides/voting-and-elections/

View attachment 533830

Thank you, that was one of my questions as my searching kept bringing up mail-in and absentee. Turning in your mail-in ballot isn't the same as going in, receiving a ballot, and voting. That would be just a drop-off point.

If I could vote in person early, I would.

 

[aprilchem]

Voted by mail, absentee ballot, because I'm an Election Official and wasn't sure whether I'd be assigned to my home polling place for Election Day. I got the ballot in the mail and returned it by dropping it in the election drop box outside our county Registrar's Office, then confirmed it was received online just a few hours later.

Turns out I have been assigned to my home polling place, but glad to get it out of the way nonetheless. It'll be interesting to how many folks will come and vote in person on Election Day - in my county early voting has been very, very popular.

 

[FlightlessDuck]

If I could vote in person early, I would.

Ditto.

 

[JimMIA]

I'm confused. Are all you going to the polls and voting early or are you calling mailing in or doing the absentee vote early voting? There isn't early voting in PA that I know of, just mail-in and absentee.

Florida has three choices:

1. Regular in-person voting on Election Day.
2. Early in-person voting from October 19 - November 1
3. Mail Ballots, which can either be mailed in or dropped off at the elections offices or early voting locations. I'm sure there will be dropoff boxes at the regular precincts as well on Election Day

We make it easy to vote, and we count the votes quickly. I dropped off our ballots Monday afternoon, and our votes are already counted.

 

[Eeyore daily]

Florida voter here

Requested mail-in ballots since I don't trust others to wear a mask. Dropped those off at the beginning of the month at the SOE so they've been received. Hurts a little missing out on voting on Election Day since I love voting.

 

[DisLiss]

DH & I mailed ours in. They've already been received, processed, and recorded, so we're all good here. Now we just have to sit back & wait for the results.

 

[bcla]

Go to vote411.org and type in your address and it will take you to your ballot. There’s a blurb about the candidates and then you make your selections and then you can email yourself the responses. Be sure to print that out because many voting locations do not allow cell phones.

I can get a copy of my sample ballot online from my county.

I've seen some interesting things going on with sample ballots. Once my polling place ran out of ballots. Voters who brought a sample ballot were allowed to vote using them, in provisional ballot envelopes. They were either counted by hand, or the ballots were individually transferred to machine countable ballots once the they were accepted. I'm not sure if that would be allowed with a home-printed sample ballot.

I looked it up and I can't seem to get an actual sample ballot. Only a listing of what candidates and initiatives are on my ballot. It's kind of weird as it's an overlay on top of the underlying website. I tried to print it out, but all I got was something where it's one on top of the other and it's hard to read. A downloadable PDF would have been much better. I guess I could take a few screen shots and print them out individually. But I don't know where my mail-in ballot. If I can find it I can just photocopy it and then turn it in at the early voting location.

 

[LuvOrlando]

Pa by mail, weren't really sure where we were going to be so we listed "travel" as our reason for absentee.

 

[bcla]

Pa by mail, weren't really sure where we were going to be so we listed "travel" as our reason for absentee.

I'm pretty sure no excuse is needed any more.

 

[sarahann77]

OH voted by mail. Absentee has been pushed in my county for years so felt comfortable doing that. First time doing it though. I just made sure to mail it by a post office in an area that's more 50/50 than an area heavy one side that someone could "lose" ballots. My board of elections isn't in an area I felt comfortable going to - hard parking, possible long lines, etc so mailed in.

We had the options:
1. Absentee mail in
2. Absentee drop off at county board of elections
3. Early in-person voting at county board of elections
4. Vote on election day at assigned poll location

 

[bcla]

OH voted by mail. Absentee has been pushed in my county for years so felt comfortable doing that. First time doing it though. I just made sure to mail it by a post office in an area that's more 50/50 than an area heavy one side that someone could "lose" ballots. My board of elections isn't in an area I felt comfortable going to - hard parking, possible long lines, etc so mailed in.

We had the options:
1. Absentee mail in
2. Absentee drop off at county board of elections
3. Early in-person voting at county board of elections
4. Vote on election day at assigned poll location

I found that most of my county does vote by mail even before the current situation with a temporary case where a ballot is mailed to all voters. Drop off locations are all over, including city halls, churches, community centers, restaurants, senior centers, etc. The location for early voting are somewhat limited, but they include hotels, churches, large auditoriums, community centers, public parks, and even one shopping center parking lot. I've seen to that shopping center where much of it is closed, but some businesses with external entrances are still open. Amazon has also taken over part of its parking lot for delivery operations. This is going to be like several of the other sites where it's outdoors but covered by tents.

Also - in my state any place that accepts a mail-in ballot will accept it from any place in the state. That includes regular polling places and early voting sites. They legally have 8 days to get them to another county.

 

[JimMIA]

I'm pretty sure no excuse is needed any more.

I have no idea what PA's requirements are, but from posts in this thread it looks like state requirements vary all over the place.

Florida doesn't even have an "absentee" ballot any more, AFIK. We just have mail ballots, with no explanation necessary. And in my county, once I requested one mail ballot, I'm automatically going to receive them through Dec 31, 2022 without any further request.

But I've seen some posts here from states that have really restrictive requirements for "absentee" ballots.

 

[bcla]

I have no idea what PA's requirements are, but from posts in this thread it looks like state requirements vary all over the place.

Florida doesn't even have an "absentee" ballot any more, AFIK. We just have mail ballots, with no explanation necessary. And in my county, once I requested one mail ballot, I'm automatically going to receive them through Dec 31, 2022 without any further request.

But I've seen some posts here from states that have really restrictive requirements for "absentee" ballots.

PA is in the news because this is the first year where their no excuse mail-in voting law has been used. And it's been crazy because there have been lawsuits about what the law requires. If you can imagine it, the law doesn't require that signatures be matched. Only that a there has to be one. That wasn't necessarily the case in the primary that theoretically used the same laws.

https://www.inquirer.com/politics/e...il-ballots-different-signatures-20201014.html

 

[JimMIA]

I can get a copy of my sample ballot online from my county.

I looked it up and I can't seem to get an actual sample ballot. Only a listing of what candidates and initiatives are on my ballot. It's kind of weird as it's an overlay on top of the underlying website. I tried to print it out, but all I got was something where it's one on top of the other and it's hard to read.

Those are probably fraud prevention measures, and fraud prevention is also probably why you can't get a .pdf.

I also doubt they would accept a printed screenshot. Think about if for a minute, and then think what someone could do if just printing ballots at home were allowed.

Heck, I tried to look at my "Personalized Sample Ballot," and because my vote has already been counted, I can't even bring up a sample ballot!

 

[bcla]

Those are probably fraud prevention measures, and fraud prevention is also probably why you can't get a .pdf.

I also doubt they would accept a printed screenshot. Think about if for a minute, and then think what someone could do if just printing ballots at home were allowed.

Heck, I tried to look at my "Personalized Sample Ballot," and because my vote has already been counted, I can't even bring up a sample ballot!

I think the key is that it would have to go into a provisional ballot envelope and can't simply be tossed into a ballot box where it will be counted.

I don't know of too many jurisdictions that still count polling place ballots at a central place. Optical ballots are usually counted on site using scanners. Touch screens have their data either stored in the machine or transferred to a piece of paper and then scanned to make it official. Then once the counts are done the results are reported to the elections office, and audited later when they get the machines back.

 

[Skippy918]

I can get a copy of my sample ballot online from my county.

I've seen some interesting things going on with sample ballots. Once my polling place ran out of ballots. Voters who brought a sample ballot were allowed to vote using them, in provisional ballot envelopes. They were either counted by hand, or the ballots were individually transferred to machine countable ballots once the they were accepted. I'm not sure if that would be allowed with a home-printed sample ballot.

I looked it up and I can't seem to get an actual sample ballot. Only a listing of what candidates and initiatives are on my ballot. It's kind of weird as it's an overlay on top of the underlying website. I tried to print it out, but all I got was something where it's one on top of the other and it's hard to read. A downloadable PDF would have been much better. I guess I could take a few screen shots and print them out individually. But I don't know where my mail-in ballot. If I can find it I can just photocopy it and then turn it in at the early voting location.

I meant you can use the paper copy Printout from vote411 of what you selected to make your choices on the actual ballot that way you don’t have to remember which candidates you are voting for. Where we live, our voting machines are electronic touchscreen.

 

[RamblingMad]

Mine has now been counted.

 

[Wendy1985]

TN explicitly stated that “fear” of COVID-19 wasn’t a reason for absentee. You have to be actively ill, or at bare minimum have an underlying condition that would cause you to have complications. And you can request it up to 7 days before an election. But if it’s Nov 3, and you couldn’t make it to early voting (like my husband, who is a teacher), and you just learned you’re positive, what do you do?

I had actually asked in Aug for the primary (we were exposed, and waiting on a test), and the person who answered the phone just told us to come in because we weren’t positive. Didn’t really have a clear answer on if we were positive- just “we’d work with you.” It didn’t really sound like they had a plan.

Imo that is starge i thought all states gave you the option to mail in no questions asked

Op here,

Not sure why the lines are so long here in Florida, maybe because we are a swing state, that everyone is really getting out and making their voice heard... my Friend waiting just right at 4 hours to vote in person yesterday.

No matter how you decide to vote... Please get out and vote. If you don't I still respect your choice... That's what America is all about...

It is such an important liberty, and right that we have here in the United States. How the people before us fought for this right... not just our fore fathers but each time we have fought for freedom, here or across the world...

We enjoy this right, that many people across the world would love to be able to get out and vote and just having a voice.

Nothing like seeing those words... Your Vote has been Counted!!!

Hi neighbor I always thought we were in a Republican state

 

[bcla]

I meant you can use the paper copy Printout from vote411 of what you selected to make your choices on the actual ballot that way you don’t have to remember which candidates you are voting for. Where we live, our voting machines are electronic touchscreen.

Not sure what my county has now. A few years ago I went to the polls at about 5 PM when they ran out of ballots. Our options were to go to another polling place where we would be limited to voting on candidates/initiatives that were on our ballot, fill in a sample ballot placed in a provisional ballot envelope, or wait for the single touchscreen machine available for accessible voting. They weren't really all that well trained on the touchscreen. It was theoretically for disabled/blind voters, but I don't think anyone had asked to use it and they were looking through their training materials on how to use it.

When they finally got that working, I was able to vote. I think it stored the vote in the machine but a printer produced a piece of paper to use for hand recounts. That went into a loose hopper in the regular counting machine. It didn't go into the slot where regular ballots were counted.

I'm not sure what they use now. A lot of the newer "accessible" systems are hybrids where there's a touch screen and possibly audio through headphones, but what it really does is mark the ballot for the voter where it's counted just like any other optical scan ballot.