"Absentee ballots" versus "mail ballots" (USA)

Well, I could name hundreds more. But since I'd started this thread questioning about absentee ballots versus mail ballots, you could start one about what Germans didn't really think through.

We Germans generally don't have the courage to leave things unaddressed in laws. But still, we do have a lot of "gaps in the law" (literal translation of Gesetzeslücke, 'loophole'.)

Since we've local (municipality and district) elections next month in my state, this is how it works here:
From 10 August, the election notifications for the local elections on 13.09.2020 will be sent out. They will arrive in the mailboxes of voters in the next few days. All Germans and EU citizens over 16 years of age with their main residence in the state are eligible to vote. An estimated 14 million letters will be sent out.

Local authorities have until 23 August to send them. For people who have just moved, the deadline is extended by five days. Those who have not received notification of their election within these deadlines should check with their local authority to see if /why are on the electoral roll.

The election notifications contain the date of the election day, the voting district and the address of the polling station as well as the necessary information for the postal vote. Most local authorities allow their citizens to request the relevant documents online via a QR code.

The Trouble With Mail-in Voting Might Not Be Fraud, But Government Incompetence
AUGUST 10, 2020 By John Daniel Davidson
President Trump has repeatedly warned of potential voter fraud associated with mass mail-in ballots for the November election, but a bigger threat might be sheer incompetence. Can we really rely on the U.S. Postal Service to handle a nationwide influx of mail-in ballots beginning next month?

So far, there’s not much reason for confidence. Last week in New York City, the Board of Elections threw out more than 84,000 mail-in ballots for the June 23 Democratic primary. That was out of a total of nearly 319,000 mail-in ballots, which means about 21 percent of all mail-in ballots were invalidated.


The New York Post reported, “One out of four mail-in ballots were disqualified for arriving late, lacking a postmark or failing to include a voter’s signature, or other defects.” What’s more, it took six weeks to declare a winner in two closely watched Democratic congressional primary races, largely because of delays associated with a surge of mail-in votes.

Elsewhere around the country, similar problems are cropping up. In Pennsylvania, mail-in ballot problems kept tens of thousands of residents from voting in the June primaries. In California, more than 100,000 mail-in ballots were rejected in the March presidential primary, mostly for missing the postmark and arrival deadlines.

Missing deadlines is turning out to be a real problem. A recent NPR analysis of 2020 mail-in primary ballots found significant rates of rejection because of late arrival. In Virginia, for example, more than 5.6 percent of all primary mail-in ballots were thrown out for arriving after the deadline. The numbers themselves are not large, but in a close election they can make all the difference—after all, Trump won in 2016 because of just 80,000 votes in three key states.

All these problems suggest the Postal Service isn’t prepared to handle an influx of voting by mail this November, as well as the possibility that no winner will be declared on election night because of mail-in ballot delays.

Postmaster General Louis DeJoy last week said the Postal Service is expecting “an unprecedented increase in election mail volume due to the pandemic,” yet insisted it “has ample capacity to deliver all election mail securely and on time in accordance with our delivery standards.”

Based on all the mail-in ballot problems we’ve seen so far this year, that doesn’t seem to be the case. The Postal Service has been bleeding money for a long time—its losses this year reached $1.5 billion, compared to $1.1 billion last year—and the coronavirus pandemic has made things worse as the volume of mail sent by businesses has plummeted. Last month, the Postal Service agreed to a $10 billion loan from the U.S. Treasury Department after congressional negotiations to give the service as much as $25 billion fell through.

DeJoy’s efforts to manage these losses, which include a hiring freeze for leadership positions announced last week, have been denounced by Democrats who sound increasingly like conspiracy theorists. Rep. Gerry Connolly of Virginia, the Democrat who chairs the committee overseeing the postal service, accused DeJoy of “deliberate sabotage to disrupt mail service on the eve of the election—an election that hinges on mail-in ballots.”

Democrats complain that DeJoy, a Republican and a Trump supporter, is a “partisan” postmaster general, and that his efforts to shore up the Postal Service are really a ploy to steal the election.

But to the extent the Postal Service has a political bias, it certainly isn’t DeJoy’s fault—and in fact, it goes in the other direction. Last month, the American Postal Workers Union’s National Executive Board endorsed Joe Biden, saying in a statement that Trump is “a serious threat to our decent postal jobs, our unions and to the right of the people to a public Postal Service.”

That’s not to say there’s a conspiracy in the other direction, that Postal Service workers are going to mishandle mail-in ballots on purpose to hurt Trump. Only that relying on a failing government agency like the Postal Service to ensure the integrity of a presidential election might not be a good idea, especially given all the problems we’ve already seen with mail-in ballots in primary elections this year.

id think, were that true, Trump would like mail ins because 30% of ballots are disappeared

Trump says he’s blocking Postal Service funding because Democrats want to expand mail-in voting during pandemic


In Germany, in a federal election, as in a local/district/state elections, the costs are borne by the state, i.e. taxpayers pay for the provision of the voting envelopes, documents and postage.
The simple reason: these are political elections, which are anchored in the German constitution. Therefore, every citizen entitled to vote must be able to participate in the respective election by postal vote.

That is a good place for it. We are not Germany.

You see, dunce, that's exactly why I started my question as a thread.

But I'm glad that you gave such an impressive answer.

Watch it, Walter. That is not nice.

The elections in Germany arent being affected by presidential thuggery like ours.

so what is the argument for mail in voting ? It's clear that it will result in an increase in uninformed, uneducated people taking part in the process....I don't think this assertion can be argued against. So why is that a good thing , for those that are in favor of it, to dumb it down any more than it is.

Why are those, who stay at home and vote by mail instead of going to their poll station
a) uninformed,
b) uneducated?

Certainly you can say that I'm one of those. (I vote by mail since years.)
My question then is: what are your parameters for
a) information,
b) education?

Why do so many other European countries not have the same vote by mail system Walter? Maybe Germany can find someway to make that happen?

One study has it that 23% o f registered votes that have less than a 9th grade education show up to vote ; 33%of registered voters vote who have no diploma, 51% of registered voters vote who have a diploma,65% vote who have some college, 71% of registered voters will vote who have a degree, and 76% who have advanced beyond a Bachelors.......

Of course, not all people who have a higher degree than a BA are informed and educated and not all people with less than a 9th grade education are uninformed, but 'on average, I assume education level obtained and intelligence are highly correlated..

If we are not careful, we are going to end up like Germany

so, again, why is it in our countries best interest to increase the participation rate amongst people who haven't completed a high school education - which is what ' the voting by mail' effort will produce?

The conservatives in my state are running pro-postal vote adds in all media.


Local elections?
I do it in the comfort of my home office
Postal vote: Better. Safe. Now.

Our state's prime minister (the state's government is a coalition goverment with the conservatives as major partner) wrote on the party's website

There are very different voting systems in European countries (and even within Germany).

I doubt that our voting system would please others.

We don't have a special "vote by mail system", but it's part of the constitutional voting rights.

yes, but it still doesn't answer my question...

Since a test of education and information before voting would be unconstitutional - I can't offer more.

Trump and the first lady requested mail-in ballots for Florida's primary election on Tuesday, according to Palm Beach County records.

"Trump and the first lady requested absentee ballots"

Pretty sure we discussed the difference between a mail-in ballot and an absentee ballot. That both are delivered by mail does make them the same thing. Is this going to need to be discussed every day?

My argument isn't that there should be test to determine eligibility. My argument is
1) that the less educated you are, the less likely you are to vote
2) mailing every registered voter a mail-in ballot will have a greater effect on the participation rate of less uneducated people than it will on educated people

Since bullets 1 and 2 are facts, the people who are supporting mail in voting must think it is a good idea to have uninformed and uneducated people have a greater impact on the election results than they would otherwise.......so tell me why