Frustrated secretaries of state from Kentucky and Michigan implored House Homeland Security Committee members in a hearing Friday afternoon to let them run their own elections without federal interference as debate rages in Washington over the reliability of mail-in balloting.
“Although I’m grateful for the CARES Act funding Congress gave us to reduce our [election] costs, I would rather you give us no funding at all if it means you’re going to tell us how to run our elections,” Kentucky Secretary of State Michael Adams told the committee. “I would encourage you to do so again, but not at the expense of any strings attached, red tape, or direction in how to run the elections that, under our federal Constitution, are tasked to the states and us, their election officials.”
Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said she chose in May to send every registered voter a paper application to request to have their ballot sent to them and to set up a website where voters could check the status of their ballot, as well as drop-off boxes and polling sites.
“In May, my decision to send every registered voter a paper application to request to have their ballot mailed to them prior to Election Day, along with the launch of a secure online portal for citizens to request to receive their ballots through the mail, were critical to educating voters about how to vote safely and remotely during a pandemic,” Benson said. “Once received, voters could return ballots through the mail at one of our new secure drop boxes across the state or in-person with their local clerk.”
Following primary elections in both states, Adams and Benson said they were better able to plan for the general election in November. For Kentucky, that means boosting the number of sites where voters can cast ballots rather than mail them. Historically, 2% of Kentuckians have voted by mail, but with that number expected to surge, including among Republicans, Adams said the state is doing what is best for residents even though it goes against President Trump’s personal opposition to voting on a ballot that was mailed to the recipient.
“A lot of Republicans are comfortable applying an absentee ballot,” said Adams. “We actually found that there was greater like of the drop boxes on the GOP side than the Democratic side in our June primary.”
Chairman Bennie Thompson worried about recent actions taken to reallocate many U.S. Postal Service mail collection boxes across the country. He charged Trump with attempting to rig the election by slowing the mail and thus ballots sent to those who count the vote. Lawmakers primarily touted the downsides to each other’s voting preferences as state officials listened.
“The problem isn’t with the post office. It’s with the states,” said ranking member Mike Rogers. “As the post office explained in three separate letters to state election officials this year, setting unrealistic deadlines for ballot requests and submissions could result in ballots not being delivered in time to be counted. You can blame the post office all you want, but when states like New York mail out over 30,000 ballots the day before an election, not even Superman could deliver them on time.”
“For everyone worried about making sure that every vote counts, this should scare you,” said Rogers. “It should also scare you that many states have procedures in place that enable ballots to be returned well after Election Day.”
