(10.13) The deadline for requesting a mail ballot for voting in the November 3 general election is Tuesday. But how does that intersect with the Monday holiday? Katherine Gregg writes in the ProJo:
The caveat: Mail ballot applications must actually be received by election officials by 4 p.m. on Tuesday, October 13, not just postmarked by that time and date, according to a reminder from Secretary of State Nellie Gorbea.
“Monday is a holiday,” Gorbea said, “so if you want to vote from home but haven’t submitted your mail ballot application yet, please drop off your application instead of mailing it.”
To be sure of meeting the deadline, voters can drop their mail ballot applications off in-person at their local boards of canvassers, after calling ahead to make an appointment.
Gregg has more info for people missing that deadline. Her piece also addresses a related issue on the agenda for a Tuesday meeting at the state Board of Elections. The Voting Access Coalition has called on Governor Raimondo to issue an executive order allowing the state Board of Elections to count ballots that are postmarked by November 3rd and received by November 6th, and to count any ballots received by mail that arrive on November 4th. This is to address the problem that occurred in the September primaries:
In the recently concluded statewide primary more than 100 ballots that were postmarked by Election Day or received the following day without a postmark were not counted. The Board of Elections estimates that ten times the number of voters will use mail ballots in November.
Our government ‘by the people’ relies on our ability to vote and have our ballots counted. But in Rhode Island, mail ballots that arrive after the close of polls on Election Day won’t be counted — even if they’re postmarked before November 3rd. With record numbers of voters expected to vote by mail this November, we expect many Rhode Islanders do not know this. More than 100 votes were not counted after the recent primary because they arrived too late.
For some reason the governor is dragging her heels on this. Read the text of the coalition letter to Governor Raimondo and then call her office at (401) 222.2080, or email her at: governor@governor.ri.gov.
The coalition includes all the usual proponents of open government and fair elections: ACLU RI, NAACP Providence, Common Cause RI, the Latino Policy Institute, RI Working Families, RI Democratic Women’s Caucus, Sunrise Providence, and counting.
Come on Gina . . . think of what Elizabeth Buffum Chace went through just so women could vote . . . just so that you could vote. Are you going to throw some of those votes in the trash in what may be the most important election for women in the last 100 years? Ask yourself: WWEBC do?