As early voting commences in many places, anyone encountering any difficulty in exercising their voting rights are reminded they should state “I request a provisional ballot and receipt as required by law”. Please pass it along to ensure maximum participation in democracy.
I just saw this somewhere else too, which raises the question: Is this the law in every state? Is it a federal law? I know provisional ballots are a thing, but I didn’t know that everyone was entitled to get one, in every state. Don’t you then have to come back with proof of whatever it was you were lacking, whether it was ID, or proof that you actually were registered?
In some cases, the voter has to prove something-- their identity, their address, something. But in other cases, the county or state does the proving. For example, I live in California, and like the large majority of California voters, I am a permanent absentee voter. I get my ballot by mail, and I fill it out and send it in or bring it to my polling place. But let’s say I lost my ballot. I could then go to my polling place, get a provisional ballot and vote it. When votes were counted, a process which takes weeks in California, the elections officials would determine that I had not mailed in my absentee ballot, and then my provisional ballot would count.
That reminds me: if the swing seats in California end up being the deciding factor for which party controls the House of Representatives, we won’t know until December. The last few close seats in California won’t be decided until then. We do count all our votes, but it takes a while.
Sorry – but especially for early voting, this is not good advice. The person should first attempt to resolve the problem or issue. The Provisional Ballot is a federal legal right, but no guarantee that it will be counted. The section about the “Placebo Ballot Problem” in the report at https://www.eac.gov/documents/2017/02/27/weiser-are-havas-provisional-ballots-working/ explains why.
When I have volunteered with Election Protection in the past, we were trained to discourage voters from requesting provisional ballots until other avenues had been exhausted.
The statement is required to be made to ensure that the potential voter’s legal rights are preserved. While it is nice that you attempted to resolve issues promptly, Calmom, and of course it is always preferable to get a good outcome as soon as possible, if the result is one is denied voting, please encourage anyone to make the statement and get a provisional ballot while the right to vote is reviewed, by courts if necessary. Voter suppression continues to be a problem in several states. Calmom, please do not discourage anyone from exercising their federal voting rights. Provide a ballot or provisional ballot upon request. We have pathetic voter participation rates currently, and those making an effort to vote have the right to have the matter reviewed.