So, you like Mail-In Ballots. Is it the convenience of having this option? After all, you don’t have to drive or walk to your designated polling place, and potentially stand in line for minutes or maybe in some cases even hours, just to do your duty as a citizen of our great Nation. Do you have any idea how the Mail-In Ballot process really works? Probably not. All you know is that you get a Mail-In Ballot in your mail, you fill it out, then send it back in the mail, or take to a Drop Box located somewhere in your local community. As far as you know, your vote then is easily and quickly tabulated representing your votes on a number of candidates and issues. But we want to share the story of what really happens to your Mail-In Ballot once you let it go either into your USPS mailbox, or into an official Drop Box. We will start by asking you if you can tell us how many times your Ballot Envelope containing your Ballot are actually touched or handled once you let it fly off into the system? Do you think a machine opens your Ballot Envelope and automatically records your Ballot choices without anyone ever touching your Ballot? Do you think one person opens your Ballot Envelope and immediately sticks your Ballot into a tabulation machine recording your choices? If you have never worked on Mail-In Ballot processing, we would like to give you a clearer picture on how your Ballot Envelope containing your Ballot is handled once it leaves your hand.
There are actually two separate ways your Ballot Envelope and Ballot can be handled. It can be handled as a group of Ballot Envelopes or Ballots, anywhere from being one of 2 Ballots Envelopes or Ballots, to being one of 50, or maybe even more. Look at the picture below:
Can you see your Ballot Envelope in the bunch above? Probably not, but it is in there somewhere. There is another way your Ballot Envelope or Ballot may be handled once it departs your possession. Look at the picture below:
This picture shows one person handing your Ballot Envelope to one other person. This is a separate individual contact with your Ballot Envelope by one person, not as part of a group of Ballot Envelopes as we showed in the picture before this one. It is important to note the two ways your Ballot Envelope, or Ballot, may be handled once it leaves your hand. In this blog we will attempt to show you how your Ballot Envelope, containing your Ballot, is really handled once it is deposited into your mailbox or Drop Box. We will concentrate on the path your Ballot Envelope takes when deposited in a Drop Box. If mailing your Ballot Envelope via USPS, it will take a variety of paths depending upon your location, the size of your community, and individual Post Office equipment and procedures in your local community. This can have a number of ways your Ballot Envelope could be handled, whether as a group of Ballot Envelopes or as an individual Ballot Envelope. In any case, your Ballot Envelope will eventually make it to your local elections center, like your county courthouse. It could be sent there by the USPS, or it could be picked up by members of the election staff who take control of your Ballot Envelope to assist your Ballot Envelope, containing your Ballot, on its way to being recorded. If your Ballot Envelope is placed in a Drop Box, it could find its way through various processes depending upon where you live. If you live in a very small county, your vote may take a more direct route to tabulation, and it may be handled less, and few machines may even be used in processing or recording your desired votes. We will attempt to view the processes from a county of moderate size to show you the route your Ballot Envelope, containing your Ballot, may take once it leaves your hand. We speak from personal, hands-on experience.
To begin with, we would like to commend those who work in elections departments, those who follow all Federal, State, and Local laws. They work hard and only desire to do their job as they have been sworn to do, and yes, many will take an Oath of Office before performing any work when handling your Ballot Envelope containing your Ballot. We cannot say that there will never be those within the election staff who may have nefarious purposes in mind. There will always be the proverbial bad apple in a barrel of good ones. It is up to individual citizens or groups, and the director of elections in your county, to see that those who intend to pervert our system of voting are identified and dealt with according to established laws. The local county sheriff has a very important and powerful role in this process and can even have more authority in these issues than a governor, or even the DOJ or FBI, as voting procedures are given by the Constitution directly to the state, and how the state then in turn has delegated enforcement authorities to individual counties.
Keeping all of the above in mind, let’s follow the journey of your Ballot Envelope once you drop it into a Drop Box. We will identify the handling of a “Group” of Ballots Envelopes with the letter (G) and count up the number of times a Group including your Ballot Envelope is handled, and (G-1) would be the first time your Ballot Envelope was handled as part of a Group of Ballot Envelopes. If your Ballot Envelope was handled by an Individual, then this will be show with the letter (I), with an associated number counting up from the beginning as (I-1). Let’s begin the journey of your Ballot Envelope.
Once you drop your Ballot Envelope into a Ballot Box, the journey of your Ballot Envelope, containing your Ballot, begins. If it is dropped into a locked box, usually found inside a courthouse, library, or sometimes even in a grocery store, it will not be handled in any fashion until it is transported to the election center. If it is placed in an outside Drop Box, it probably would be handled as a group of Ballot Envelopes (G-1), as they would be scooped out into a tub of some sort for transport to the election center. Once your Ballot Envelope arrives, the box or transportation tub is unlocked and turned upside down to dump the Ballot Envelopes out into an area where each Ballot Envelope will be individually handled (I-1) as they are stacked into another bin, oriented in the same manor, to be sent to a processing machine. The processing machine will do an initial run-through of the Ballot Envelopes to ensure their validity, where signatures are matched with the most recent one on record. An individual will grab a group of Ballot Envelopes to put into the processing machine (G-2). The Ballot Envelopes come out on the other end and are usually grabbed by an election worker as a group of Ballot Envelopes as they are divided by precincts and stacked up (G-3). However, they could come out as an individual Ballot Envelope, and sometimes do. If these Ballot Envelopes pass muster, they are then prepared for opening. To do this, Ballot Envelopes are shaken in some manner or “pounded” (G-4) so as to move the interior Ballot to the top or bottom of the Ballot Envelope so that the top or bottom can be cut open (avoiding cutting the Ballot within) for easier handling later on down the line. The processing machine can do this work as well but requires and individual to, once again, load the machine (G-5). They are then, once again, gathered by an election worker and placed in trays for continued processing (G-6). If the Ballot Envelopes have to be sliced open individually, then they would be handled by another machine that can do the same process. In this case, Ballot Envelopes would be grouped together, but not always, depending on the machine and the dexterity of the machine operator. Some Ballot Envelopes do not pass muster in the processing machine and are sent forward to a signature verification process, but this is normally done electronically without handling any Ballot Envelope.
Now we can talk about removing the Ballots from the Ballot Envelopes. Two individuals, one from each major party, sit side-by-side for this process. The first individual grabs an individual Ballot Envelope from the tray (I-2) and removes the Ballot inside, separates it from any Secrecy Envelope that may surround the Ballot, then hands the Ballot to the other individual who unfolds it and lays it in a stack (I-3). The remaining Ballot Envelopes and Secrecy Envelopes and retained for archival storage required by Federal and State law. The stacked Ballots are collected by another individual (G-7) who places them for movement into the Ballot inspection area. Here, individuals check out each Ballot (I-4) for discrepancies such as duplicate voting for individual candidates or issues, torn or soiled Ballots, or extraneous marks or writing. Those Ballots are then sent to another group of individuals who examine each Ballot (I-5) to determine if a voter needs to be contacted for a potential provisional Ballot, which would in turn be re-inserted into the tabulation process at some designated stage or time. Some Ballot issues can be resolved in-house using a team of bipartisan individuals who will transcribe the voters chosen votes to an unsoiled Ballot (I-6) that can be successfully processed through the tabulation machines. Once all Ballots are properly presented, they then move to the vote tabulation area. Those Ballots are then moved into the vote tabulation area (G-8) and are then processed through the tabulation machines when vote counting begins (G-9). Ballots are then archived.
Be advised that we have not included all potential ways a Ballot Envelope, or the included Ballot, may be handled, but this is the normal process. Handling could be more; it could be less. What should not be in dispute are the number of ways Ballot Envelopes (G-9) and Ballots (I-6) are normally handled. Your Ballot Envelope and Ballot are handled at least 15 times! This handling is extensive and requires an enormous amount of detailed work by election workers. Be proud of their efforts to help provide our FREEDOM and LIBERTY within this great Nation of ours, by contributing their efforts to maintain a free and fair election.
We will note in conclusion, that if there are any anomalies within our Nation’s voting systems using Mail-In Ballots, it would either come from unauthorized Ballots being injected into the USPS mail system or Drop Boxes. This could come as a result of Ballots Envelopes containing Ballots being sent to unauthorized individuals who are either non-citizens, have moved out of the voting area, or who have died. This is what drives the movements to “clean up” voter rolls, to expunge those potentially fraudulent voters. Also note that we have not yet discussed the potential for outside interference in our tabulation machines. As we have mentioned in a previous blog, both major parties have said these machines are hackable. “I continue to think that our voting machines are too vulnerable.” (Democratic Representative, Adam Schiff of California). “The biggest seller of voting machines is doing something that violates cybersecurity 101.” “Directing that you install remote access software which would make a thing like that – you know – like a magnet for fraudsters and hackers.” (Oregon Democratic Senator Ron Wyden). “You could easily hack into [voting machines]. It makes it seem like all these states are doing different things but, in fact, three companies are controlling [elections].” (Minnesota Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar). “There are a lot of states that are dealing with antiquated machines, right: Which are vulnerable to being hacked.” “I actually held a demonstration for my colleagues here at the Capitol where we brought in folks who – before our eyes – hacked election machines, those that are being used in many states.” (Then Democratic Senator Kamala Harris, now our Nation’s Vice President). (westernjournal.com; July 19, 2021.) In addition, on June 3 this year, our Nation’s top cybersecurity agency, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency warned of such flaws (theTrumpet.com; Andrew Miller; June 16, 2022). Be sure to cast your vote this coming election day, November 8, 2022. The direction of our Nation depends upon your vote!