Military Absentee Ballot Issues

For absentee voters voting season is fast approaching. The deployment of over 100,000 troops in Iraq and Afghanistan mean that the numbers of absentee ballots coming from military personnel overseas will be much higher they were in 2000.

Surely you remember that one of the dirtier political tricks of the Florida recount was staged by the Gore team – attempting to get military absentee ballots disqualified due to postmark problems. Fortunately a court ruled that signed and dated absentee ballots must be counted regardless of postmark issues.

From – Absentee ballots can make a difference[…] The Military Postal Service Agency is also taking precautions to uphold the integrity of the voting system. Each absentee envelope will be inspected by post office workers for proper date stamping.

“We believe this will diminish the problems we saw in 2000,” said Tech. Sgt. Wes Smith, a postmaster here. “Incomplete and inappropriate postmarks, which plagued the last general election, will not be a problem this time.”Keep that in mind if there are issues or challenges this year. Whether the issues highlighted by the 2000 election will be a problem this year could be a function of how close the race is.

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  1. Sharp as a Marble July 23, 2004
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  6. Marina October 17, 2004