[EL] Quick question about provisional voting in California

Tue Aug 18 13:31:38 PDT 2020

Apologies for the late contribution to this discussion. Lisa is correct—if you are in a VCA county they have the technology to print your correct ballot if you show up at a vote center and ask for one, as well as to see if you have already voted in the file. From the text of the law:

(E) (i) The vote centers provided under this section have an electronic mechanism for the county elections official to immediately access, at a minimum, all of the following voter registration data:
(I) Name.
(II) Address.
(III) Date of birth.
(IV) Language preference.
(V) Party preference.
(VI) Precinct.
(VII) Whether or not the voter has been issued a vote by mail ballot and whether or not a ballot has been received by the county elections official.

I’ve also heard that a few non-VCA counties will have this ability, even though they still use polling places.  Can’t vouch for that, however.

Doug is also correct that LA did not mail every voter a ballot in March. But because they will now be required to provide a VBM ballot due to COVID, they will have a full VCA approach this fall. That means in November over half of CA voters will be covered by this system.

Eric

P.S. Not to muddy the waters further, but any part of LA county in a congressional or state legislative district that overlapped with Orange county *was* required to send every voter a VBM ballot by default in March. That was about 13% of the county’s voters, or ~700,000 registrants.

Eric McGhee
Senior Fellow

PUBLIC POLICY
INSTITUTE OF CALIFORNIA
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Any opinions expressed in this message are those of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect any position of the Public Policy Institute of California.

From: Law-election <law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu> On Behalf Of Douglas Johnson
Sent: Monday, August 17, 2020 7:12 PM
To: Lisa Bryant <lbryant at csufresno.edu>
Cc: Election Law Listserv <law-election at uci.edu>
Subject: Re: [EL] Quick question about provisional voting in California

Capturing just how confusing this all is even for those spending a lot of time studying it, the statement that " about 50% of CA voters lived in a VCA county where they automatically received a ballot in the mail for the primary election" is incorrect. That reflects a common misperception about the status of Los Angeles County, which was a pseudo-VCA county. Los Angeles set up vote centers rather than traditional precincts, but did NOT mail every voter a ballot. Taking Los Angeles out of the count drops that percentage from 50% to 25%. (For those not from California, Los Angeles County is slightly over 25% of the state's population).

But the statement about 60% of voters being permanent absentees sounds correct to me, though I did not double-check that.

- Doug

On Mon, Aug 17, 2020 at 1:45 PM Lisa Bryant <lbryant at csufresno.edu<mailto:lbryant at csufresno.edu>> wrote:
Yes, "most counties" did not receive ballots automatically, but about 50% of CA voters lived in a VCA county where they automatically received a ballot in the mail for the primary election this year. In those counties, if they didn't take their ballot to the vote center with them the vote center printed a new ballot and voided the mailed ballot. They did not have to vote provisionally.

Even prior to VCA, over 60% of registered voters in CA were registered for permanent absentee ballots, as high as 75% in some counties. CA also has a couple of counties that are were exclusively VBM prior to VCA due to small populations and their rural nature.  CA, as a whole, is pretty familiar with VBM and absentee ballots.

Best,
Lisa

Lisa Bryant, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, Department of Political Science
Survey Director, Institute for Leadership and Public Policy
California State University, Fresno

On Mon, Aug 17, 2020 at 1:28 PM Douglas Johnson <djohnson at ndcresearch.com<mailto:djohnson at ndcresearch.com>> wrote:
But that primary was an election where in most counties you actively requested a ballot (either for that election or as a permanent absentee). This November election millions will get mail ballots they never requested - will they know to bring them with them to surrender?

Eric McGhee or Thad Kousser (or anyone from that team), has your research with the early “Vote Center” counties shown any indications of how much this is an issue?

- Doug

On Mon, Aug 17, 2020 at 12:04 PM Pamela S Karlan <pkarlan at stanford.edu<mailto:pkarlan at stanford.edu>> wrote:
Dear Fred and Nate,

If the primary is any indication, at my polling place, it seemed that most of us who were voting in person did hand in our VBM ballot.

It's interesting that the Secretary of State's website doesn't say anything about this.:  https://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/voting-info/ways-vote/

Pamela S. Karlan

Kenneth and Harle Montgomery Professor of Public Interest Law

Co-Director, Supreme Court Litigation Clinic

Stanford Law School

karlan at stanford.edu<mailto:karlan at stanford.edu>

650-725-4851

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From: Law-election <law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu<mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu>> on behalf of Fredric Woocher <fwoocher at strumwooch.com<mailto:fwoocher at strumwooch.com>>
Sent: Monday, August 17, 2020 11:52 AM
To: Nate Persily <npersily at law.stanford.edu<mailto:npersily at law.stanford.edu>>; Election Law Listserv <law-election at uci.edu<mailto:law-election at uci.edu>>
Subject: Re: [EL] Quick question about provisional voting in California

Nate,

I do not know the answer for certain, but unless the voter hands in the unvoted VBM ballot, I don’t see how it could be otherwise.  For those counties that will still be using traditional polling places, there is no other way for the pollworkers to know whether the voted VBM has already been returned prior to casting a ballot at the polling place.

I believe some counties that have the ability to use electronic polling books, with real-time countywide information on who has voted and by what means, may be able to avoid the use of provisional ballots, but I don’t see how that can be avoided in other counties.

And this has the potential to introduce an additional grounds for invalidating the voted ballot, because many people forget to sign their provisional ballots in every election.

Fredric D. Woocher

Strumwasser & Woocher LLP

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From: Law-election [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu<mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu>] On Behalf Of Nate Persily
Sent: Monday, August 17, 2020 11:45 AM
To: Election Law Listserv <law-election at uci.edu<mailto:law-election at uci.edu>>
Subject: [EL] Quick question about provisional voting in California

Does anyone know if the voters who will choose to vote in person in California this November will need to vote a provisional ballot?  That is, given that all active registrants will receive ballots in the mail, will those who opt for polling places necessarily be casting a provisional ballot, rather than a "normal" ballot?

----------------

Nate Persily

James B. McClatchy Professor of Law
Stanford Law School
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