As the 2024 general elections inch closer, voters have been receiving 2024 Michigan absentee voter ballot applications from groups unaffiliated with the state or local clerks. While it is legal for such groups to send these, a series of requirements must be met.
The practice is common and often done by non-profits and partisan leaning groups. Voters can fill these out and turn the applications into their local clerk’s office. The ballots must meet a series of requirements to be accepted at a clerk’s office.
According to state law, those who distribute these applications must print on a certification signature box, a legal warning and instructions. Local clerks must match the signatures on the third-party ballots with a signature on file, according to a statement from a spokesperson at the Secretary of State's office.
“There are lots of third-party organizations and just people, going out there and doing voter registration drives and that is legal," said Minde Lux, Isabella County's clerk. “They have to meet certain qualifications and requirements, but the biggest thing is that they cannot promote nor take payment for registering people to vote,” she said.
As for how safe they were, Lux said anyone unsure about an application they’ve received in the mail can get one from the state. “Go straight to, Michigan.gov/vote and/or straight to their local township clerks, they can even go to their county clerks if they want,” she said.
Lux said she was concerned that applications like this might feed into distrust of the voting system. She cited the fact that the mailers appear to be sent en masse, even to voters who are already registered to vote or have moved from the state.
“I personally have received five myself, so I know whoever these organizations are that are sending them out they're not really looking into who they are sending them to,” she said. “If they were really concentrating on who they're sending them to, I don't think they'd be sending them to the Isabella County Clerk.”
“I am just worried about people basically feeding into these applications being real without going to the real site. I don't like that they are sending them out, but there's nothing that we can do to stop them,” Lux said.
There is a question as to whether the mailers are effective in getting people registered. Central Michigan University political science professor Thomas Greitens suggests that there isn’t much to suggest that these mailers are widely effective. He pointed to a peer-reviewed study.
“During the pandemic, I know many people were suspicious of those registration applications. I know I got them in the mail, and it was like, ‘oh, what's this? I’ve never seen something like this before,’” he said.
Greitens did say it might spurn others to go vote. “It might get more people aware that, ‘oh, I need to go register to vote.’ So, they go to the county office or the clerk's office, but the numbers I've seen on this, it's a low threshold.”
