Adventures in Mail-In Voting!

[Joe Republic]

Chapter 1

I moved from Nevada to California last summer.  I never gave two thoughts about my existing voting registration in Las Vegas, until I got notified by email that a mail-in ballot had been sent to my address.  As in; the address where I no longer live.

I have to rely on two things to ensure that voter fraud isn't being committed in my name; (1) the new tenant in my old address (a complete stranger) didn't try to fill out my ballot and mail it in, and (2) if they did, the authorities catch it and throw it out.

I looked into how to cancel my voter registration, and you have to print out and fill in a form and then send it back.  Yeah ain't nobody got time for that when you have a full-time job, a screaming toddler, and no printer.


Chapter 2

Here in California, my wife and I were each mailed our ballots.  We filled 'em out, and she dropped them off at a drop box by the local library, around October 24th or so.  She signed us both up for the 'BallotTrax' service from the CA Sec of State, to notify us once the ballots were accepted.

My wife got her email confirming they received her ballot.  I did not.  Logging into the service myself, I see a note that my ballot was reprinted and a new one being sent out to me...?  Sure enough, a second ballot in my name showed up after I had already voted.

Still no confirmation of my original ballot's acceptance, even today on Election Day itself.  Luckily there's a phone number for El Dorado County Elections office, which I called a few hours ago.  The pleasant old lady informed me that due to a problem (?) with the vendor responsible for printing ballots, the first batch of ballots were all voided (!), and new ones reissued, which explains why I received a second ballot.

My next question of course was if my ballot will still count if it had been voided.  She told me that my original ballot will have been set aside (?), and will only be counted if I don't turn in the reprinted ballot.  If I do turn in the second ballot, the original will be thrown out.



So... yeah.  Guess I just have to trust the system here.  But I'm not exactly wowed by it.