President Trump and many of his supporters have called into question the validity of voting by mail. But documented instances of voting fraud are few and far between. That’s why rather than fraud absentee voters should be focused on following the rules.
Macomb County GOP Chair Mark Forton says his faith that President Trump will be re-elected is limited by just one thing.
“My only fear is voter fraud. It's mentioned all the time, but nobody really believes it," Forton said. "Nobody really in power does anything about it. But it's there. It’s there big time.”
In Michigan, there have only been five documented instances of voter fraud in the last 10 years. That’s according to cases tracked by the Michigan Secretary of State’s Office and the conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation. Of these five recorded instances only two involved absentee ballots.
So state officials say Michigan voters shouldn’t necessarily be too worried about voter fraud. But that doesn’t mean they should have blind faith in the Democratic process, either. The system is only as good as its weakest link and for many voters that link is themselves.
In the August primary, about 10-thousand absentee ballots went uncounted in the state because of personal voting errors. Of those, more than 22-hundred ballots were thrown out because a signature required on the ballot return envelope was omitted or didn’t match what was on file.
Michael Siegrist is the clerk of Canton Township. He says absentee voters are supposed to sign their return envelope to reduce the chance of fraud.
“It is about protecting an individual's right to vote and making sure that they in fact, were the person who voted the ballot,” says Siegrist.
But when a voter forgets to sign or uses a new signature, the rules can keep their ballot from being counted. That’s part of the reason why a new state law passed in October requires clerks to contact voters when they find a signature issue. Siegrist says in order for the law to be effective, clerks need to have voters’ contact information handy.
“Most people if they've put a phone number or an email on their application, you can get in touch with them fairly easy, and that is a majority of the people who apply," said Siegrist. "If you don't have an immediate form of contact, you would have to write them a letter. That's unfortunate.”
Absentee ballots can also be thrown out when a resident moves and then votes using a location other than where they’re registered on Election Day. More than one thousand absentee ballots were discarded in the August primary for this reason. Discrepancies may have occurred because, if a Michigan resident moves and updates their driver’s license, the new address is automatically applied to their voter registration. This can cause problems when a person moves after they mail in their ballot.
But the biggest self-inflicted election mistake in August was that absentee voters missed the deadline. More than six-thousand people didn’t get their ballots in to their clerks’ office by 8 p.m. on Election Day. Their votes were not counted.
In September, a Michigan Court of Claims judge ruled that – due to postal delays – ballots would need to be accepted as long as they were postmarked by the day prior to the election and arrived before November 17th. But that decision was rejected last week by the Michigan Court of Appeals. That means ballots – once again – need to arrive by 8 p.m. on Election Day in order to be counted.
Michigan Secretary of State Spokesperson Jake Rollow says his department is urging voters to not take any chances by putting their ballots in the mail.
“It is beneficial to voters to get their absentee ballots in as soon as possible," said Rollow. "So that they have them in hand, you know, we're saying, fill them out, sign the back… take them directly to their clerk's office or their clerks’ drop box.”
If a voter decides to use a ballot drop box they need to make sure they use one in their own community that is picked up by their local clerk.
Oh and one more thing. Voters need to remember to actually put their ballot inside the envelope before they return it. Thirty-one people made that mistake in August, and their votes were not counted. And to put that in perspective that means mailing an envelope without a ballot inside was a bigger issue in the last election than voter fraud.