Voting Briefing
Editor’s note: This short follow-up to earlier articles about voting is not comprehensive. For more information, see our Voting Q&A and Voting Briefing.
October 19 is the last day to register to vote in this year’s election.
October 27 is the last day for the county election office to receive your application for a mail-in or absentee ballot for this year’s election.
November 3 is Election Day. Polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.
“Don’t Leave Your Ballot Naked.” Image: Barb Chotiner
No Naked Mail-In Ballots
Swarthmorean Jayatri Das reminds voters:
Don’t leave your ballot naked. In Pennsylvania, mail-in ballots must be first enclosed in a secrecy envelope to guarantee confidentiality, then in the return mailing [“declaration”] envelope. Ballots missing their secrecy envelopes will not be counted.
According to Delaware County officials, over 100,000 vote-by-mail ballots were mailed on October 3, with an additional 9,000 slated to be sent out during the week of October 6. The county’s election bureau will continue to process vote-by-mail applications through October 27.
Election Hotline and Websites
The Delaware County election phone hotline is open Monday to Friday 8:30 a.m. – 8 p.m. and Saturday 9 a.m. – noon: 610-891-VOTE. By calling this number, you can obtain information from trained staff about voter registration, mail-in ballots, vote-by-mail applications, polling place locations, ballot boxes, deadlines, and more.
Delaware County’s election website has information, ballot applications, and election news.
Swarthmore resident Beth Soch, who volunteers on the Pennsylvania Democratic Party’s voter assistance line, recommends that people who want to check the status of their mail-in ballot request use this (nonpartisan) website, which requires you to provide only your name, date of birth, and county of residence.
But she warns that the site is sometimes overwhelmed, and doesn’t always work. So if you run into a problem, try again later. “90% of my calls are people wanting to know when they’ll get their ballot,” she says.
Soch also recommends the site iwillvote.com, where people can look up information including the location of their closest ballot box or early voting site.
More About Mail-In Ballots
Soch explains:
Mail-in ballots will be processed as they come in. The information on the declaration envelope will be checked against the voter rolls, and the voter should receive a confirmation of receipt via email.
What happens next? Soch notes that, under current law, no ballots will actually be counted, or votes recorded, until Election Day. Election officials will not be allowed to remove the inner ballot envelope (the so-called “secrecy envelope”) from the declaration envelope to open it, even in order to get the ballots ready for scanning, until November 3.
Soch says that it’s possible, though unlikely, that this rule will be changed between now and then. She hopes it will be changed, she says, since this would save time on Election Day.
Finally, the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania has made a video explaining how mail-in ballots work.
