Voter rights under assault in Pennsylvania
By Ben Bright July 19, 2020
In late June, the Trump campaign sued the 67 county election boards in Pennsylvania in federal court over the recent expansion of mail-in ballots in the state. Joining the Trump campaign in the filing are U.S. Reps. Guy Reschenthaler (who represents Washington County), Mike Kelly, John Joyce, and Glenn Thompson. All four are Republicans from Pennsylvania. This lawsuit is a prime example of voter suppression and an attempt by the Trump campaign to interfere in states’ rights where recent legislation has expanded the ability of our citizens to exercise their constitutional right to vote.
Voter suppression is when there are barriers to being able to cast a vote. Examples include the consolidation of polling places or long lines at the polls, voter purges from the rolls, strict ID laws, or even malfunctioning voter equipment. These issues all can lead to voter disenfranchisement and a lack of trust in the system. And often these issues directly affect certain groups over others. For instance, if polling locations in a poor area are combined, this may make it much more difficult for voters to be able to vote in person due to lack of public transportation to a poll that may now be much farther away. Long lines at the poll may disenfranchise many who do not have the time to wait for hours due to work or family commitments. Limiting a person’s ability to vote creates a system that is distrusted by the masses, further eroding the relationship between the public and elected officials at all levels. Every person should have an equal ability to have their voice heard, and one way Pennsylvania lawmakers have attempted to help is through the expansion of the rights of voters to vote by mail.
The expanded use of mail-in ballots (which are the same thing as absentee ballots) came about last year when the Republican-led state Legislature passed Act 77 and was amended this year with SB 422. These bills gave all Pennsylvanians the ability to vote by mail without an excuse. They also expanded the dates that county boards of elections could begin sending out ballots to 50 days before the election, and lengthened the cut-off date to apply for a mail-in ballot to the Tuesday prior to the election. And the changes, mostly due to the pandemic, were used in large numbers during the June primary. Over 1.8 million mail-in ballots were requested across the state and from those, over 1.4 million ballots were completed and sent in. These numbers are expected to grow even higher for the Nov. 3 presidential election.
The Republican lawsuit against mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania takes aim at two particular areas. The first is the use of “collection boxes” by county boards of election to allow voters to drop off their completed ballots instead of putting them in the mail. The argument is that these boxes (which were used very little in Pennsylvania and not at all in Washington County) would allow “illegal absent and mail-in voting, ballot harvesting, and other fraud to occur …” None of this is true. The process of applying to vote by mail and receiving a ballot is full of checks and balances to eliminate fraud. In all of Pennsylvania, with over a million votes cast by mail, not one case of fraud was uncovered. Collection boxes give more people the opportunity to vote without having to purchase stamps, and also allows for ballots to be dropped off in a secure location until the close of polls on Election Day, removing the fear of voters that their vote will get lost in the mail or delivered too late to be counted.
The other area being disputed involves ballots that are missing the interior “secrecy” envelope. When a voter receives a mail-in ballot, there are many steps to ensure both the legitimacy of their ballot and that their vote remains private. On the outside of the envelope the voter is required to place their name, address, date they filled out the ballot, and signature. If any of these items are missing, the ballot may not be counted (though many counties will return the ballot to the voter in an attempt to rectify the error). The voter also should place the ballot in an enclosed secrecy envelope to ensure that others cannot see their votes through the envelope or during the count. However sometimes the ballot is returned without the secrecy envelope. The lawsuit suggests this error should invalidate the vote. This is ludicrous. No person is harmed by the absence of a secrecy envelope with the only issue being that the voter may allow someone to know for whom they voted. The voter made a mistake in possibly making their vote public, which should never mean the vote should not count. The only reason to attempt to deny these votes as legitimate is to suppress mail-in votes.
Recently the Washington County Election Review Board gave recommendations regarding possible improvements to election practices leading up to the November election. Dave Ball, chairman of the board and vice chairman of the Washington County Republican Party, presented the 26-page report to the county commissioners. In the report issued by Ball’s committee, none of the issues in the Trump lawsuit are mentioned. Instead the report focuses on procedures that can be improved to make ballot counting quicker and more efficient, all of which should be explored. But it seems the Trump lawsuit is a case of the GOP searching for a solution where there is no problem.
Many studies have shown that voting by mail does not give either party an edge in results. However with the current divisiveness in the country, especially in regard to how to manage the COVID-19 crisis, voting by mail has leaned significantly in the Democrats favor in Pennsylvania. And in response to the Republican lawsuit, the Pennsylvania Democratic Party and several Democratic politicians filed their own lawsuit in state court. This suit asks for the exact opposite of the initial Republican one, looking to expand the use of mail-in voting collection boxes, allow ballots that are postmarked on Election Day to be counted, require all counties to give voters a chance to rectify mistakes on their mail-in ballots, and to count all ballots that are missing secrecy envelopes. All of these issues expand rights of voters, giving more people the opportunity to have their vote counted. To have a true democracy we must make voting accessible to all. If not, the words of Thomas Jefferson will continue to ring true: “We do not have government by the majority; We have government by the majority who participate.”
Ben Bright is chairman of the Washington County Democratic Committee.
