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VOTE-BY-MAIL: the FACTS the COVID-19 Crisis Poses Extraordinary Challenges for Public Health, Our Families, and Our Democracy

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VOTE-BY-MAIL: the FACTS the COVID-19 Crisis Poses Extraordinary Challenges for Public Health, Our Families, and Our Democracy VOTE-BY-MAIL: THE FACTS The COVID-19 crisis poses extraordinary challenges for public health, our families, and our democracy. With deaths and infections continuing to rise, it’s critical to ensure Americans don’t have to choose between their health and their vote this November. Congress must provide the $4 billion necessary for states to implement policies to protect the right to vote while ensuring public health and safety. House Democrats negotiated a $400 million down payment for our elections with the CARES Act signed into law earlier this year, but Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is refusing to provide the additional $3.6 billion passed by the House in May. It’s key to maintain in-person voting options, including early voting, but one other popular, time- tested, secure option that will ensure that Americans from all backgrounds don’t have to choose between their health and their vote during the ongoing pandemic is vote-by-mail. A lot is being said about vote-by-mail right now so we have put together some helpful facts on the subject. FACT: VOTE-BY-MAIL IS SAFE AND SECURE • News outlets have repeatedly found no examples of widespread voter fraud. Facthecks by the AP, CNN, the Washington Post, NBC News, Vox, and Fortune - among countless others - have all reached the same conclusion: evidence of voter fraud, including with vote- by-mail ballots, is nearly non-existent. • Election experts agree voting fraud is exceedingly rare. Think tanks across political spectrum have also concluded the same: The Brennan Center for Justice said the risk of voting fraud is 0.00004% to 0.0009%, while even the Heritage Foundation’s database that was created to track and provide evidence of widespread voter fraud has found that just 0.00006% of total vote-by-mail votes cast over the past two decades were fraudulent. • There is no legitimate concern over voter fraud. It is more likely for an American to be struck by lightning than to commit mail voting fraud. Voter fraud is even rarer than winning the Mega Millions. Over the hundreds of years of allowing U.S. soldiers to vote-by-mail from far-flung war zones, there have been no proven instances of widespread fraud. FACT: VOTE-BY-MAIL IS TIME-TESTED AND HAS BEEN WIDELY USED, PARTICULARLY SINCE THE COVID-19 OUTBREAK • The Armed Forces have been using vote-by-mail for over 150 years. In the 1864 presidential election, about 150,000 Union soldiers voted absentee in what became the first widespread use of non-in-person voting in American history. By World War II, every state let servicemembers vote remotely. With the help of Congress, absentee voting by overseas armed service members has skyrocketed over the past decade. • Millions of Americans vote-by-mail every election. In 2018, more than 31 million Americans - over one-fourth of all voters - cast their ballots by mail. Since 2000 more than 250 million votes have been cast via mailed-out ballots, in all 50 states. • Absentee ballot requests and votes have spiked in primaries held since the COVID-19 outbreak. As of mid-May 2020, the number of absentee ballot requests had spiked more than 10 times on average over 2016. In at least four of the eight states that held primaries on June 2nd, turnout surpassed 2016 levels, with most of the votes being cast via mail. Each of those states took steps earlier this year to send absentee ballot applications to all of their registered voters. FACT: VOTE-BY-MAIL IS POPULAR AND NONPARTISAN • There’s no evidence that vote-by-mail favors one party or another. Vote-by-mail has been found to increase turnout by an average of 2% to 4%, with low-participating voters more likely to be influenced than others. As states have expanded their use of mailed ballots over the last decade, both parties have enjoyed a small but equal increase in turnout, including in Georgia’s and Nevada’s recent primaries. • Thirteen current Republican Members of Congress were elected in the five states that run elections by mail. Former Sen. Gordon Smith (R-OR) was the second-ever U.S. Senator elected in an all-mail election back in 1996. GOP Sen. Cory Gardner was the first Colorado U.S. Senator elected when the state moved to mail-only elections. GOP Sens. Mitt Romney and Mike Lee of Utah were also elected under vote-by-mail. GOP Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, previously chair of the House Republican Conference, has been re-elected several times to Congress under Washington’s vote-by-mail system. • Top Republican officials vote-by-mail even as they falsely complain about fraud. President Donald Trump and at least 15 Administration and campaign officials have voted- by-mail. This includes Vice President Mike Pence, Attorney General William Barr, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, senior White House aide Kellyanne Conway, GOP Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel, and Trump campaign officials including campaign manager Brad Parscale. • Trump’s 2016 win was fueled by his success in states that allow all voters to vote-by- mail. Trump won 18 states in 2016 that had no-excuse vote-by-mail options, accounting for three-fifths of all states he won. These states gave him a combined 153 electoral votes - exactly half of his total electoral votes. Trump’s 2020 campaign has launched an “aggressive” absentee-ballot program in every competitive state and his own children have recorded robocalls urging voters to vote “safely and securely” by mail. Ensuring that Americans can vote safely and securely amidst the pandemic is not a partisan issue. It’s good for Republicans, Democrats, and everyone else. “ Former Gov. Tom Ridge (R-PA) FACT: VOTER SUPPRESSION MOVEMENT IS FUNDED BY GOP SPECIAL INTERESTS AND DARK MONEY MEGADONORS • Republicans have launched a multi-million dollar voter suppression strategy to reshape state and local election rules, resist the expansion of voting rights, and amplify anti- voting rhetoric nationwide. While the Republican Party has a long history of using these types of tactics, this is a direct consequence of a 2018 federal court ruling that lifted the ban which previously prevented the RNC from engaging in poll watching and other so-called “ballot security” activities. As a result, Republican committees and soft dollars will be used to significantly expand the budget, institutional knowledge and coordination of “election monitoring” efforts for the first time in nearly 40 years. • This effort is being supported by a web of GOP dark money groups with ties to the vast conservative dark money network. The so-called Honest Elections Project, True the Vote, Judicial Watch and the Public Interest Legal Foundation are tax-exempt nonprofits that do not publicly disclose their donors, but have extensive known ties to dark money funding sources. All are currently working to support voter suppression efforts, and efforts to help hide their megadonors like the billionaire Kochs and Betsy DeVos’ family. FACT: VOTE-BY-MAIL SYSTEMS HAVE SAFEGUARDS IN PLACE TO PREVENT FRAUD • States have practices in place to prevent fraud. When ballots are received, they’re matched against personal information stored on the voter rolls. Most jurisdictions use barcodes on ballot envelopes to track processing. In addition to traditional mail, states provide secure drop-off locations and drop boxes. States perform post-election audits to identify irregularities and there are harsh penalties for those who violate the law. • It’s key to maintain in-person voting options, including early voting. In-person polling sites provide a mechanism to correct problems, provide essential services, and ensure that every eligible voter can cast a valid ballot. No system that relies on mail balloting can operate without accessible in-person voting sites, both for those who cannot or will not vote by mail and as a fail-safe to problems that may arise. • Republicans are wrongfully conflating no-excuse vote-by-mail and universal mail-in voting to create fears of voter fraud. Republicans like President Trump who say they support absentee voting but not voting-by-mail are making a distinction without a difference when it comes to security. Every state already has some sort of vote-by-mail process with various safeguards built into their systems, including thirty-four states and the District of Columbia that have no-excuse absentee where anyone can request an absentee ballot. President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence are among at least 16 senior administration and ! campaign officials who have voted by mail. FACT: ELECTION OFFICIALS OF BOTH PARTIES ARE EXPANDING VOTE- BY-MAIL OPTIONS AND HAVE BEEN VOCAL ABOUT FUNDING NEEDS • States are changing election rules in response to the pandemic. Nearly 30 states have changed rules or practices for this year’s primaries or the general election in response to the public health threat posed by Covid-19, affecting roughly 86.6 million registered voters. Through May 2020, eleven states that had not allowed no-excuse absentee voting had expanded absentee voting for their primaries — expanding access to absentee ballots for more than 40 million people. • These changes are bipartisan. State leaders from both parties - including Republican officials in states such as Iowa, Ohio, and West Virginia - have announced decisions to facilitate absentee voting for people who fear contracting the coronavirus by casting ballots in-person. This falls in line with new CDC guidance calling on states to put in place alternatives in addition to in-person voting to avoid spreading coronavirus. • There is widespread agreement that states need more funding to prepare for this year’s unprecedented elections.
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