What’s to Stop Mail Voting Problems?
To the Editor:
The American Postal Workers Union’s National Executive Board has voted to endorse Joe Biden for President of the USA. My opinion is not to disparage our local postal employees; however, in some areas of the country, one must question how much activism the union will play in the upcoming election.
With the importance of a presidential election in the balance, how effectively will the postal system be able to handle a large number of mail-in ballots? A number of news outlets are testing the system by sending mock envelopes through the mail to see how many envelopes arrive at their destinations on time. I haven’t found any, so far, that received 100% arrivals.
Between 2012 and 2018, 28.3 million mail-in ballots remain unaccounted for, according to data from the Federal Election Assistance Commission. The missing ballots amount to nearly one in five of all mail-in ballots. These are ballots mailed to voters in states that do elections exclusively by mail.
In the Bush/Gore election, mail-in ballots were problematic.
Remember the hangingchad people? The Miami-Dade County Post Office found in their facility late missing mailbags with ballots. This called into questions whether the ballots should be counted. In another county election office, the mail-in ballots stored in their closet were forgotten. They were not counted on election day. In some states, primary run-off elections were held too close to the general election. By the time the state printed off the general election ballots and sent them to military personnel overseas, the ballots were returned too late to be counted.
Every job has a few bad apples. Postal carriers destroying/hiding mail are no different. News stories about postal carriers dumping tens of thousands of undelivered mail for years in their home basements are recorded. In NJ on 4/25/20 mail-in ballots were undelivered or just left on shelves or in bins near apartment mailboxes.
This makes me wonder….. Will ballots mailed in concentrated Trump neighborhoods go missing? It takes only a few bad apples or well-motivated activists.
Carol Kelly
La Grange