On Sep. 23, 2024, election officers in Madison, Wisconsin, announced that they had mistakenly despatched duplicate absentee ballots to round 2,000 voters. “The Clerk’s workplace has been contacting voters individually to tell them of the error, warning them to submit just one poll, and to destroy the second to keep away from any confusion,” their preliminary assertion learn.
The disclosure was amplified by conservative media, which urged the incident might enable for duplicate voting and introduced proof of a hyperlink between potential voter fraud and mail-in voting.
Probably the most-significant questions revolved round the potential of folks voting twice, because of receiving a number of ballots. Of their preliminary assertion, Madison officers mentioned this was not doable as a result of the barcodes on the ballots had been similar:
As a result of the duplicate ballots have similar barcodes, within the unlikely occasion {that a} voter submits two absentee ballots, just one might be counted. As soon as that barcode is scanned, the voting system doesn’t enable a poll with the identical barcode to be submitted.
On Sep. 25, Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany of Wisconsin, whose district doesn’t embrace Madison, posted an image of a poll on X, suggesting he had caught election officers in a lie over the existence of a barcode:
As Madison officers later clarified, the aforementioned barcode is on the envelope used to return the poll by mail, not the pages on which voting alternatives are made. “They claimed it was on the poll, and solely modified their quote after we uncovered it,” Tiffany acknowledged in response to backlash about his barcode declare.
As reported by The Related Press, election officers say it is not uncommon to refer to make use of the time period “poll” as inclusive of the envelope:
Kevin Kennedy, who was Wisconsin’s high elections official for 33 years and is at present a member of three nonpartisan boards that work in elections, mentioned utilizing the time period “poll” when really referring to the envelope is usually achieved each by election staff and the general public.
“If that is the energy of your argument, specializing in somebody misspeaking, that is not the problem,” Kennedy mentioned. “It most likely says extra in regards to the motives of the speaker if that is what they are going to deal with.”
On X, Snopes asked Tiffany why he felt such a distinction was significant, given the truth that absentee ballots usually are not full with out the figuring out barcode, and that an envelope is important for a poll to be counted. He didn’t reply to our request for remark.Â
How Did This Occur?
Madison officers say they found the issue when voters alerted them that that they had acquired a couple of poll. After investigating, they discovered that human error throughout an information importation brought about the duplicates to be despatched to 2,215 voters across 10 voting wards.Â
“The affected ballots had been restricted to a single file with a single header code. We have now checked and verified that no different batches had been duplicated, nor have we acquired any reviews from different voters,” the Madison Clerk’s Workplace mentioned in response to Tiffany’s inquiries.
How Does Absentee Voting Work in Wisconsin?
In Wisconsin, anyone can request an absentee poll for any purpose. Those that select this may use “the pre-addressed, postage-paid envelope included along with your poll packet” to ship the poll to election officers, drop it off in individual on the county clerk’s workplace or bodily take it into the voting precinct on Election Day. Voters must have a U.S. citizen witness signal that very same envelope:
Earlier than you start, line up a witness who can confirm that you simply crammed out your individual poll. Select an grownup U.S. citizen who just isn’t a candidate within the upcoming election. Subsequent, fill out your poll fastidiously. As soon as your poll is full, place it within the licensed envelope. Then seal and signal the certificates envelope, and ensure your witness provides their tackle and signature, too.
The need of an envelope just isn’t some new invention, neither is the notion {that a} accomplished poll explicitly contains an envelope. The picture beneath is an envelope from a 2020 Wisconsin election (barcode in purple):
State regulation explicitly references the envelope as a requirement for absentee voting:
The absent elector, within the presence of the witness, shall mark the poll in a fashion that won’t disclose how the elector’s vote is solid. The elector shall then, nonetheless within the presence of the witness, fold the ballots so every is separate and in order that the elector conceals the markings thereon and deposit them within the correct envelope.
“No poll is counted with out being enclosed in a certificates envelope,” Madison Clerk Maribeth Witzel-Behl mentioned in an e-mail.Â
What Prevents Duplicate Voting?
Merely possessing a replica poll, in different phrases, doesn’t afford somebody the power to vote twice. If somebody despatched in each of their ballots earlier than the election — as Madison officers have already clarified — the primary poll can be scanned and the voter can be recorded within the ward ballot e book as having voted.
Any further poll would even be assigned the identical quantity within the ballot e book, and it will not be counted. “As soon as a poll from a voter has been marked as returned on the ballot record,” Witzel-Behl informed Snopes, “any subsequent poll from the identical voter can be rejected.”
Some folks online claimed there’s a loophole should you return your absentee poll on Election Day itself. Below this principle, somebody might return a accomplished envelope to a polling place and vote previous to it being scanned by the system.
This, too, is not possible. That is as a result of absentee ballots acquired on Election Day usually are not scanned till after in-person voting is over. Your in-person vote can be logged within the ballot e book, thus stopping the counting of the absentee poll. Witzel-Behl defined:
If a poll is delivered on to the polling place, the barcode just isn’t scanned on Election Day however is scanned after Election Day to trace voter participation and the standing of the poll. The election inspectors learn the identify and tackle that the Clerk’s Workplace preprinted on the return envelope and test that towards the ballot e book. As soon as a poll from a voter has been marked as returned on the ballot record, any subsequent poll from the identical voter can be rejected.
The Backside Line
There isn’t a solution to vote twice in Wisconsin, even if in case you have two copies of the identical absentee poll.
The declare that county officers lied in regards to the existence of barcodes on ballots is belied by the long-documented historical past — and authorized requirement — that Wisconsin absentee ballots embrace an outer envelope with a witness assertion. The envelope, which comprises a novel barcode, is an express component of the poll below state regulation.
Regardless of the Madison workplace’s administrative error, two programs are in place to forestall duplication — a barcode that’s distinctive to every absentee voter and a ballot e book that data receipt of every voter’s participation, as described by Witzel-Behl:
Every ward has two copies of the ballot e book. Two ballot staff test every voter, together with absentee voters, into the ballot e book. They assign every voter a sequential quantity (the quantity on the voter slip you might be given), and write the quantity within the ballot e book.
When you have a quantity subsequent to your identify on the ballot e book, which means you’ve voted in individual or your absentee poll has been processed by the ballot staff. Ballot staff write the letter A after a voter slip quantity for an absentee voter, indicating that the voter was an absentee voter.
Any registered voter, whatever the method during which they voted, will get just one entry within the ballot e book. “You possibly can solely be checked into the ballot e book as soon as,” Witzel-Behl informed Snopes, “You possibly can solely get assigned one voter slip.”
