Pete Perry authored this post. Given the recent flareup over early voting among our elected officials, JJ thought it might spur debate if someone presented the case against early voting.
As proposed by Senate Bill #2654, “No-Excuse” Early Voting would allow Mississippi voters to cast ballots in person at their County Circuit Clerk’s office for 15 days prior to Election Day, be that a primary, special or general election.Currently, Mississippians have the right to cast an absentee ballot during the 45 days prior to Election Day if they qualify based on one of thirteen reasons provided in the election code. Many voters may cast their absentee ballot by mail (i.e. over age 65, being temporarily or permanently disabled, currently residing out of the county such as a college student); otherwise, the absentee ballot would be cast in person in the Circuit Clerk’s office. Recently, many thousands of voters (including 17,000 in Hinds County’s 2020 election) have chosen to vote by absentee ballot, with many standing in lines for hours while doing so.
Whether early voting is beneficial or harmful, and whether it should be expanded or restricted, are subjects of debate – and while those debates should consider the state – as well as the specific election – when arguing specific survey results or analysis to support or oppose the policy, most don’t with supporters generally relying on generic statistics, often without supportive data to back their claims.
Supporters of early voting argue that it increases voter turnout among ‘certain groups’, reduces waiting times at the polls, is easy to implement, and accommodates more voters.
Opponents of early voting argue that it leads to ill-informed voting, creates logistical concerns (many Circuit Clerk’s offices are not physically capable of handling the traffic while providing security to the process or the voter) and fraud risks both with honest and possibly dishonest officials conducting the process. Other reasons presented with more specific cases against the policy include the benefit it provides to incumbents, damage to down-ticket candidates, the fact that late changing issues that could change voters’ choice are prevented, and addressing the fallacy that Early Voting would provide reduced wait times or provide convenience to a voter. One last argument against the process is the loss of unity in the State and Nation; not so long-ago Americans assembled on one designated day – Election Day – to choose our local, state and national leaders; the move to this misguided policy adds to the disunity across among our citizens and across our country.
Until the 1980’s, states offered Americans only two ways to vote: in person on Election Day or with absentee ballots intended for those unable to vote in person because of disability of illness. Today, some 40 states allow some form of “early voting” – eight have an all-mail voting system where every voter receives a mail-in ballot by default. In other states the length of early voting periods range from three to 46 days.
The number of Americans casting their ballots early has risen steadily. In the early 1990’s, approximately 7% of voters did so; in 2020 – which was the highest voter turnout in our country’s history, approximately 30% of ballots were cast prior to election day, with roughly half of those being done by mail-in absentee ballots and the other half through in person voting (including ‘no excuse’ and absentee ballots.)
Supporters of early voting tend to argue that it increases voter turnout; in a 2022 article for The 19th, attorney Christina Das of the Legal Defense Fund argued early voting helps people, especially women, overcome barriers preventing them from voting. NYC Votes, an initiative of the New York City Campaign Finance Board, listed on its website in 2019 reasons why it believes early voting is good for democracy, including: “Being able to vote early gives voters more opportunities to cast their votes; instead of voting all on one single high-stakes weekday, voters will be able to pick a time that works for them.” Further they argue having more days for voting means faster and more efficient Election Day lines. “Early voting means Election Day lines are shorter, allowing poll workers more time to make sure the processes are working smoothly.” However, opponents of Early Voting counter the arguments (actually, the argument is only one – convenience) presented by these supporters with substantial and significant impacts on the voting process and potentially on the results.
While early voting may seem more convenient, it appears to have the opposite effect of what its proponents sought: it actually decreases turnout. A number of studies, including one by American University and another by professors from the University of Wisconsin, conclude states that adopted early voting have lower voter turnout than states without early voting.
The 2013 University of Wisconsin study found “early voting lowers the likelihood of turnout by three to four percentage points”. In fact, the longer the window of early voting, the greater the effect of lowering turnout. This may seem counterintuitive, but that is what the studies show; the reason why has not been determined conclusively. One reasonable theory is allowing voters to vote over an extended period before Election Day diffuses mobilization efforts. Candidates and political parties spend an enormous amount of time and resources on get-out-the vote efforts just before Election Day. If those efforts have to be spread out over several weeks, then they will not have the same intensity and may not be as effective in reminding and persuading individuals to cast a ballot.
Voting early makes strategic voting more difficult –one of the most significant dangers is something may occur on the last few days of the electoral season after millions (national) or thousands (local) citizens have cast an irrevocable vote. Early voters are voting with a different set of facts than those that vote on Election Day, as happened in upstate New York in 2009 in what was at the time a three-candidate race for Congress. One week prior to the election, the Republican nominee withdrew from the race because she was losing to the Conservative Line candidate. But at the time of her withdrawal, there had already been 18,000 votes cast for her by ‘early voters’ – voters that would have likely chosen the “Conservative Party” candidate as their second choice. But those votes had been cast and could not be changed. A week later, the Democratic opponent won the election by less than 6,000 votes. Did early voting make the difference? Most observers and political pundits agree it did, and Democratic candidate Bill Owens was elected to fill the former Republican held seat.
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Another example occurred in the 2017 special election in Montana where one day prior to the election one candidate was charged with misdemeanor assault against a reporter for the Guardian newspaper. Two of the state’s largest newspapers withdrew their endorsements that day – but by that time 70% of Montanans had already cast their vote and had no opportunity - it they thought this incident was important to their choice – to change their vote, And, again, another common occurrence – in the 2016 presidential primaries, Senator (now Secretary) Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican, garnered more than 70,000 votes in Arizona, even though he had dropped out of the race a week before the election. Those who had already cast their votes for him wasted their ballots. John Kasich came in fourth behind Senator Rubio losing by only a little over 6,000 votes, leading one CNN analyst to say that Kasich was beaten by “Rubio’s ghost”.
The arguments made by supporters can all be consolidated into one – convenience for the voter. Let them vote when they want to, without being troubled by being limited to a 12 hour period on a specific day. Breaking this down into components the argument fails on its face; it is not more convenient for most voters to travel to their county courthouse, find a place to park, and get to the Circuit Clerk’s office than it is for them to travel to their local polling precinct, park and enter the building. Further, when they do get parked and into the courthouse, the idea that there will not be lines is a fallacy; with today’s absentee voting there are many days when lines at the Clerk’s office wind out of the building and onto the sidewalk – and that’s with only those that qualify for absentee voting being present; add the argued increase turnout and all having to cast their ballots at one place rather than multiple precinct locations throughout the county suggest that the Early Voting lines will result in longer, not shorter, waiting times.
In small towns, that happen to be a county seat, its true that the travel distance to the Courthouse and one’s precinct location could be similar in time and distance; but for all those voters who are in larger cities, or in towns/cities that are not the county seat, and for rural voters, the travel time and distance from one’s home to the Circuit Clerks office compared to their voting precinct could be substantial ranging from 15 minutes to an hour – both ways. And in most cases, parking at a precinct location is much easier than at county courthouses.
Scheduling to vote, finding some time between 7 AM and 7 PM on a specific day could be compared to scheduling for a doctor’s appointment; its nothing more than noting that on November “X”, you will go vote, but in this case (as opposed to the time your doctor offers) you can choose your time; early – on your way to work; mid-day or mid-afternoon when there is literally nobody at the precinct voting; or on your way home from work. Its really no harder than other things you schedule – kid’s program at school, doctor appointment, civic club meeting, etc.; just a matter of letting participating in our democracy take some degree of priority with one’s time. Early voting lowers the ‘price’ of participating in an election in terms of time and inconvenience. But that also means it cheapens the vote, which means people value it less. When voting becomes easier…. more people vote who are less engaged in the process.
Moving to other reasons to oppose this radical idea, one supported strongly by the Democratic Party for years both nationally and here in Mississippi and that supporters try to ignore or poo-poo as they talk of the ‘convenience’ benefits:
1): It benefits incumbents over challengers. (OK, maybe it's true that some of those supporting the bill happen to recognize and like the fact that it aids and assists incumbents, but we’ll ignore that for a moment.) How does it help incumbents? Look for a moment at a mid-level statewide race – say Secretary of State.
There is no question that it is hard for a SOS candidate to raise money, except for the incumbent (and here not aiming at any particular individual or office; the same would apply to Auditor, Insurance Commissioner, Treasurer, or a District Commissioner). As a challenger with limited resources a well managed campaign would budget its media expenditures working back from Election Day - which would be fine if all voters were going to be casting their votes on Election Day. Early Voting though would change when many will cast their ballot, having already decided their choice for Governor,or maybe their friend running for some other position. With the incumbent having had adequate funds to start a media campaign several weeks prior to Election Day – unlike the challenger - including prior to the start of Early Voting. their name is the only one known to many of those voters. Admitting the incumbent has a definite advantage anyway, increasing time required to use limited resources, they should not be given an incremental disadvantage to the challenger.
2) last, but far from least, is the issue of conducting the election. Election administration costs will be significantly increased, as will campaign costs for candidates. Most Circuit Clerk’s offices do not have the physical capacity to handle these numbers of voters during the two weeks provided: it is reasonable to assume they will still need to handle the same absentee voters they have been having spread over a 45 day period and now along with cramming them into their limited spaces they will have to accommodate these new “convenience early voters” who have chosen to travel to the Courthouse and find a place to park, “just because”.
Worse, and of importance, is the potential for fraud that Early Voting provides. Today, political parties and candidates are allowed to have present at voting precincts credentialed poll watchers who are allowed to challenge individuals if they have reason to question someone’s ‘right’ to vote. (Note: There are specific reasons spelled out in detail in our election statute that allow a challenger to file such a challenge.) These same procedures are allowed to challenge an absentee voter’s ballot, when that ballot is being considered by the County Resolution Board ON ELECTION DAY. But with the enactment of Early Voting, the only way to continue this protection would be to have poll watchers present in the Circuit Clerk’s office each day for fifteen days while it is open for “early voting”, in addition to having them in precincts on Election Day.
Early Voting under this bill would eliminate the protections allowed by this provision of the statute because no candidate, or party (should a party wish to attempt such – but that would depend on the policies and processes of the party – you decide) would be able to afford the cost of having full-time poll watchers for three weeks in the Clerk’s offices throughout the state. And the idea that this is not ‘needed’ because – as the proponents argue, this is all being done in the Circuit Clerk’s offices, and therefore its safe and secure - frankly, just doesn’t hold water.
While most of our state’s 82 Circuit Clerks are honest and well-meaning public servants, the group is not immune to having their own bad apples. Just as not every public official, local, state or national, is pure as driven snow, it includes Circuit Clerks as well. It has been proven that we do have officials – sheriffs, justice court judges, district attorneys, school administrators, mayors, alderman, you name it – that have not been honest stewards of their office.
We should not blindly accept as truth without anything but “trust me” that every Circuit Clerk is an honest steward either; especially when it includes the most basic part of our democracy. There are election controversy cases where the integrity of the circuit clerk has been questioned - and proven; thus they should not be cumulatively and absolutely assumed to be beyond question as the supporters of SB2654 suggest. Currently they are entrusted with absentee ballots that are cast in their offices or mailed to them by voters and they are to safeguard them until they are processed on election day. Some have failed at doing that properly and securely.
Under Early Voting, Circuit Clerks would be given carte blanche access to unlimited stacks of ballots which they could use as they chose, without the provisions the current absentee balloting process provides that allows via statute a way to catch one that misuses the process, The proposal before us today with SB 2654 leaves us the only option of “trusting them, its being done in the Clerk’s office so it will be ok”. I’m sorry, but for me that’s not enough, particularly when looking at some of the process in some specific counties where most of our ‘close’ elections are ultimately decided.
Early voting seems to damage the civic cohesiveness inherent in having voters throughout the state, and the country, turn out on a single day to choose our leaders. Given the costs, and the tendency to lower turnout, early voting is a “reform” that we should continue to pass on in Mississippi.
16 comments:
The politicians affected by voting do not care about all these possible impediments to democracy cited by this writer. They only care about winning and a threat to their power. If their voters are the likely benificiaries of early voting they are for it. If not, they are against it. Same with the political parties, all the other arguments are just political posturing and bullshit. Winning is the only thing.
"Vote early, vote often" (Joe Biden 2023)
All that aside, for me to decide whether I'm in favor of it or not, all I have to find out is who supports it. And isn't that true of most everything in politics?
Early voting. Championed by conservatives in Florida, Louisiana and Texas. I think only Mississippi, Alabama and Kentucky are the only remaining states without it. When have those three been the sole states to be correct about anything?
Me, I'm just a regular guy, just like you. And speaking now as just a regular guy, allow me to submit to you that in a half century of participating in this wondrous experiment in free and open democracy, I have never had any difficulty or travail in just dragging my ass to the polls on election day and casting my ballot.
And so, as a regular guy I say to you, Mr. Regular Guy and Miss Regular Guyette, there is no need for early voting. Plan ahead and drag your ass to the polls just like I do. It really ain't difficult to do.
Would lefties in cemeteries be able to vote early also? Asking for a dem.
In 2020, I spent 2 hours at the pool, when I went mid morning before lunch. I got to the door, but I had another engagement and had to leave. I came back mid-afternoon and waited 2 more hours to vote. So 4 hours, instead of the just like “scheduling a doctor’s visit” (which is an appointment and not lineup at an urgent care situation.
In 2024 I voted twice via absentee, because I work out of the county every day. The first time I went on the Friday before the election and waited 30 minutes. The second time I waited less than 10 (if that).
I’ll continue to vote early for big elections. Likely not for primaries or local elections that don’t take long. I’d appreciate if the top-down state government we have actually served the public, instead of their own controlling interests.
The fact that Delbert Hosemann and David Blount support this legislation speaks volumes. But, since they are both Democrats, it is understandable.
There is not anything approaching veto-proof majorities in either the House or Senate in favor of early voting in Mississippi.
Thanks Pete for the detailed analysis. I know it is your opinion but that is how the Barksdalers mislead by calling opinions 'analysis'. Seriously, that took some effort to write and I appreciate it. Now if Lumumba could impose, is there anything you can do to help the Zoo with those Perry dogs?
I don't disagree with anything you've written , Pete, but you've forgotten rather a lot of folks have work that take them out of town. Some even have contract obligations out of the country.
I can't , of course , fault you for never being 8-9 months pregnant but doctors do deliver babies on the election days. Some of us know there are still men who don't think women should vote at all and some would never , of course, vote for a woman.
Indeed, doctors schedule surgeries on election days for male patients!!
So, those doctor appointments are known but we patients know these days, if you miss one that is scheduled, it may be months before you can get another. Medicine is a business as much as a profession these days Then there are doctors on call during voting hours or emergency room doctors who might be delighted to be guaranteed they'll get to vote.
Not just guys in the military ( women too for now) but their wives may need to mail in or early vote for a variety of reasons. You might be surprised how many wives help keep the gear and uniforms and skivvies clean. Those in the National Guard can get called up unexpectedly.
Police and Fire Depts and all those in emergency services are open 24 hours a day, every day. Jail and prisons don't shut down and personnel rotates.
Real life is far more complicated than it was in the past. And, in the past, it was also far too easy to keep employees on the job during voting hours. Sadly, there are some employers who'd now do that out of greed and not because they don't want a certain group to vote.
In all the places where early voting was challenged, no deliberate fraud was found. The usual "thrown out vote" is a released convicted felon who didn't know he couldn't vote until his parole ended. But here's the dirty secret...if everyone showed up that is eligible to vote, no precinct could handle it. 10's of millions didn't show up in 2024. They've never showed up.
Always you have needed a birth certificate and a form of ID to register to vote. That USED to be all that was needed even before computers. Records of registered voters are in the clerk's office. Death certificates are sent by funeral homes to county clerks and to the Social Security administration.
I remember a certain elected woman in your party who culled the list of registered voters and didn't do it well and the one who challenged the votes of a former bank president and his wife donor and his wife. Don't you remember?
I'm not loyal to either party. But, I sure hate it when our best and brightest children want to serve in government and get run off, don't you?
Make election day a national holiday. This would go away. Until then, sometimes people have work conflicts. Not everybody is retired and able to take 3 hours to wait in line to vote (nor can everybody sit around on a computer all day like some of yall).
What we need are election laws that Ed and Babs can't scam to install their kids into the legislature. Just ask Andy Taggart.
I have been voting in Mississippi for nearly 40 years and I have never waited more than 30 minutes to vote in person. If you have to stand in line for hours you need to elect better election commissioners.
Elections in the U.S. is already pretty much worse than in third world countries. People vote several times, ballots are sent out to people who do not even live in the state and some are dead, people are hired to go to rest homes and load up a bus with voters who do not even know where they are but the people driving them will be glad to help them choose who to vote for. There is really no need to vote in the first place. The media chooses who they want to win. All the citizens who go to vote are just slowing down everything. Instead of standing in line to vote you should stay at home and hire an illegal to go vote for you. They have much more power with the politicians.
It’s mostly the fraud part that deters me. Your ballot floating there for days or weeks. There are controls to protect it but it doesn’t make me feel warm and fuzzy like dropping it anonymously into a locked box day of.
Thank you 11:36 for giving your one time 'bad experience' which happened to be the election with the largest turnout of voters this state has experienced. You didn't bother to mention your precinct - so it could be determined if there had been an issue at that precinct that caused the wait, or if it was just due to the large turnout.
During that same election, November 2024, I went to the Hinds County Courthouse to vote absentee on the last Saturday (I had learned two days earlier that I had to be traveling out of state the next week) and stood in line from 9:15 that morning until 4 that afternoon; the lines came out of the east side of the building and wrapped around the sidewalk and passed the JPD station. After I voted, there were still people outside the building waiting to get inside. (And, in the FWIW column, my standing in that line stood out, just as I'm sure my absentee vote did in the County totals.)
Every election will have some anonomiles but those shouldn't be used as the measurement of a process.
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