This morning the Senate Rules Committee held a hearing about problems associated with military and overseas voting. While the report released by committee chairman Charles Schumer (D-NY) explains the urgent need to reform the military and overseas voting process, it offers almost nothing new.
Data gathered by the committee and the Congressional Research Service from surveys of election offices in California, Florida, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas, Washington, and West Virginia (the home states of 43.5 percent of America’s deployed military members) show that over one quarter of the ballots requested by military personnel were either not collected or not counted. Specifically, 441,000 ballots were requested under the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, yet 98,633 of these ballots were never properly returned to election officials, and 13,504 were ultimately rejected upon receipt.
The Schumer report points to a January 2009 Pew study indicating that half the nation’s states fail to provide sufficient time for military and overseas voters to complete and return their absentee ballots.
Under current military overseas voting provisions, a deployed member of the military who wishes to request an absentee ballot must complete and mail the “Federal Post Card Application” (FPCA) to the proper county clerk to either simply register to vote, or to both register to vote and to request an absentee ballot. Upon receipt of the FPCA, the clerk processes the request and then mails the absentee ballot back to the military member, who must then complete and mail it back to the clerk. This entire process is completed via “snail-mail” and, according to the Military Postal Service Agency, may exceed three weeks’ time.
The Schumer report highlights the significant barriers military and overseas voters still face. In doing so, it echoes earlier reports. In February 2009, the Overseas Vote Foundation (OVF) released the results of its Post 2008 Election Survey of Overseas and Military Voting, notably finding that 22 percent of the 24,000 voters surveyed did not receive the official ballot they expected.
Many Americans who fight for citizens’ rights are still denied one of the most basic rights the country provides. The Schumer and OVF data should help to draw increased attention to this great failure in American election administration.
For more information, see “Finish the Fight for Our Soldiers’ Right to Vote” and “Make Absentee Voting Easier for Military Members.”