Should we adopt Mail-in voting?

[San Lumen]

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Why do they have no value and what makes mail in better? Why can't we have both?

They have no value because they produce no benefit. There is nothing there. I have concealed the benefits of voting at a polling station behind this spoiler text.

NIL

I just said you can have both. Mail in is better because you don't have to go to the polling place.

You have not laid out any reasons for why polling places should be done away with.

[Des-Bal]

You have not laid out any reasons for why polling places should be done away with.

I just said you can have both.

I don't know why you're quoting me when you're not fucking reading.

[Jabberwocky]

I've mailing my ballots for 25 years.

[Midlona]

I like the mandatory turnout idea

This concept always seems so odd to me. Why would you want people who otherwise wouldn't vote to vote?

[Wallenburg]

Most of my mail ballots I've submitted directly to in-person polling places anyway. It helps to have time to think about what you're voting on, and to not need to go to the ballot box with a pre-researched list of selections.

[United Calanworie]

They have no value because they produce no benefit. There is nothing there. I have concealed the benefits of voting at a polling station behind this spoiler text.

NIL

I just said you can have both. Mail in is better because you don't have to go to the polling place.

You have not laid out any reasons for why polling places should be done away with.

Because there's no need for them in a 100% vote-by-mail system. Oregon doesn't have them. We do fine. Ballots get mailed out with plenty of time in advance, we vote, we stick them back in the mail, or if we're running late, we drive to the nearest dropbox and stick them in before 8PM on election day. We just finished an election, actually... and once again, we didn't need a single polling site.

Combine that with motor-voter laws, and voting is simple, easy, and efficient. No reason to not participate when there's no barrier to entry.

[Undemocacy]

I think mail in voting should be adopted in the US, alongside making election days a public holiday so people do not have to work and making voting compulsory.

it would lead to a 100% voter turn out.

[Risottia]

No.
The potential for vote-rigging is way too high. If you can't vote at a polling station because you can't be moved from your domicile for medical reasons, the electoral office should send an polling station official, along with a police officer, to your house and have you vote there in person.

[San Lumen]

No.
The potential for vote-rigging is way too high. If you can't vote at a polling station because you can't be moved from your domicile for medical reasons, the electoral office should send an polling station official, along with a police officer, to your house and have you vote there in person.

You have any proof of this?

Washington, Oregon and Colorado have have postal voting for years and there has been no widespread fraud.

[The Black Forrest]

No.
The potential for vote-rigging is way too high. If you can't vote at a polling station because you can't be moved from your domicile for medical reasons, the electoral office should send an polling station official, along with a police officer, to your house and have you vote there in person.

I keep hearing about massive voter fraud. Still waiting for the proof.

I do hear “potential” comments often enough.

We should put the voting booths under ground as there is a high potential for an attack by the Romulans, Borg or Klingons.

[Juansonia]

I like the mandatory turnout idea

This concept always seems so odd to me. Why would you want people who otherwise wouldn't vote to vote?

It's not forcing them to vote, it's forcing them to show up (they can no longer use "I'm busy" as an excuse not to vote).

I think mail in voting should be adopted in the US, alongside making election days a public holiday so people do not have to work and making voting compulsory.

I'd be fine with mandatory turnout, but mandatory voting is too far.

[San Lumen]

This concept always seems so odd to me. Why would you want people who otherwise wouldn't vote to vote?

It's not forcing them to vote, it's forcing them to show up (they can no longer use "I'm busy" as an excuse not to vote).

I think mail in voting should be adopted in the US, alongside making election days a public holiday so people do not have to work and making voting compulsory.

I'd be fine with mandatory turnout, but mandatory voting is too far.

Turnout should not be mandatory either.

[Northern Socialist Council Republics]

I can actually see the reasoning behind mandatory voting in countries like the United States where making time to vote is often a significant challenge.

Not because I believe that people have any moral obligation to vote, but because it would help preserve their right to do so.

Mandatory voting would make it difficult to disenfranchise people by untenably long queues at the ballot box or by holding them up at their place of employment since they'd have an actual legal obligation to be present come hell or high water.

[The Black Forrest]

I can actually see the reasoning behind mandatory voting in countries like the United States where making time to vote is often a significant challenge.

Not because I believe that people have any moral obligation to vote, but because it would help preserve their right to do so.

Mandatory voting would make it difficult to disenfranchise people by untenably long queues at the ballot box or by holding them up at their place of employment since they'd have an actual legal obligation to be present come hell or high water.

Hmmmm mandatory voting would only cause more problems. Enforcement. Voting by “fuck it” Which probably means greater ignorance on issues.

[Juansonia]

I can actually see the reasoning behind mandatory voting in countries like the United States where making time to vote is often a significant challenge.

Not because I believe that people have any moral obligation to vote, but because it would help preserve their right to do so.

Mandatory voting would make it difficult to disenfranchise people by untenably long queues at the ballot box or by holding them up at their place of employment since they'd have an actual legal obligation to be present come hell or high water.

Hence why I support mandatory turnout with no duty to vote.

[Vassenor]

No.
The potential for vote-rigging is way too high. If you can't vote at a polling station because you can't be moved from your domicile for medical reasons, the electoral office should send an polling station official, along with a police officer, to your house and have you vote there in person.

Minuscule number of potentially fraudulent ballots in states with universal mail voting undercuts Trump claims about election risks

As nearly every state expands its capacity for absentee voting this year, President Trump and his GOP allies have attacked the process as prone to rampant fraud.

“MAIL-IN VOTING WILL LEAD TO MASSIVE FRAUD AND ABUSE,” Trump tweeted last month. “ . . . WE CAN NEVER LET THIS TRAGEDY BEFALL OUR NATION.”

But a Washington Post analysis of data collected by three vote-by-mail states with help from the nonprofit Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC) found that officials identified just 372 possible cases of double voting or voting on behalf of deceased people out of about 14.6 million votes cast by mail in the 2016 and 2018 general elections, or 0.0025 percent.

The figure reflects cases referred to law enforcement agencies in five elections held in Colorado, Oregon and Washington, where all voters proactively receive ballots in the mail for every election.

The minuscule rate of potentially fraudulent ballots in those states adds support to assertions by election officials nationwide that with the right safeguards, mail voting is a secure method for conducting elections this year amid the threat of the novel coronavirus — undercutting the president’s claims.

[San Lumen]

I can actually see the reasoning behind mandatory voting in countries like the United States where making time to vote is often a significant challenge.

Not because I believe that people have any moral obligation to vote, but because it would help preserve their right to do so.

Mandatory voting would make it difficult to disenfranchise people by untenably long queues at the ballot box or by holding them up at their place of employment since they'd have an actual legal obligation to be present come hell or high water.

Hence why I support mandatory turnout with no duty to vote.

Why have mandatory turnout but not mandatory voting.

Voting is a right which means you also have a right not to exercise that right and that includes not showing up a polling site.

[Katganistan]

Why? You ever stood in a long line outside a polling place in November? It sucks.

In Colorado we have mail-in voting for everything, it works great.

If people are going to be made to go to the polls in person then Election Day should be on the weekend so a lot of citizens don't have to lose time off work in order to vote.

I don’t think I’ve ever waited for more than half an hour.

Good for you. I stood for three hours in pain in 2020 with my cane. The line was literally half a mile long, and that was for EARLY VOTING.

[El Lazaro]

Hence why I support mandatory turnout with no duty to vote.

Why have mandatory turnout but not mandatory voting.

Voting is a right which means you also have a right not to exercise that right and that includes not showing up a polling site.

Showing up at a polling site isn’t voting

[Royal Frankia]

It would be better to select our representatives at random from the general population, so long as they serve only one term.

[The Pacific Northwest]

I’m another person from a state that’s been voting by mail for years. I’ve never voted any other way and my mom only ever voted in person once, and that was to vote to move to mail only. So it’s been awhile.

Instances of voter fraud are incredibly low and they absolutely do check signatures. I was registered to vote when I got my learner’s permit as a teenager and then sent my first ballot when I became eligible to vote. My first ballot was actually flagged for verification. My driver’s license lists my full name, including middle. But I’ve never personally used my middle name anywhere, including my signature. But because the signature on my ballot was only first and last and not middle, they flagged it. Even though I signed my license with only my first and last, but whatever.

I also have an aunt whose stepdad thought he would be nice and vote for her. Signed her name and everything. That one was also flagged and that’s how she found out her stepdad had tried to vote for her. It apparently wasn’t malicious and the stepdad actually just ignorant and thought that was actually something that was allowed. So they absolutely do look.

Obviously some ballots will be issued to people who can’t vote because they’re underage or dead or something because no system is 100% fool proof. Some will slip through the cracks. But the chance of it happening on such a large scale, and then enough people took advantage of it that it would influence the outcome of an election is extremely unlikely. A handful of people voting independently to try to sway an election because they happened to be issued a duplicate ballot, or got a dead relative’s ballot or something isn’t going to do much in the grand scheme. And you sign the envelope you put your ballot in. It would be obvious if say, a mail carrier tampered with it. I’m pretty sure they would notice if someone had opened the envelope. And they’d have to forge your signature if they switched envelopes. You can also check if your ballot has been received by the Elections Office online so if it gets lost somewhere you’d know that too.

I mean how would it even be possible to coordinate it on the scale required to change the outcome? Does a group of people get together and somehow track down every single wrongly issued ballot and then forge all those signatures well enough that they don’t get flagged? Not to mention there probably aren’t even thousands of those ballots out there to begin with.

I personally really like this system and it’s made voting super easy. I used to live somewhere without a car where I would not have been able to reach a polling station easily so this system has definitely resulted in me voting more often.

As for homeless people, the Secretary of State’s website says they are allowed to use any address in the county they live in for their place of residence when registering, and anywhere they can pick up mail for a mailing address. So they could use a PO box, or even the county Elections Office if they need to. From what I’ve read it shouldn’t be too difficult for a homeless person to register to vote and receive ballots. There are designated ballot drop boxes at county court houses and city libraries all over the place so there’s no need to mail it back either.

[Risottia]

No.
The potential for vote-rigging is way too high. If you can't vote at a polling station because you can't be moved from your domicile for medical reasons, the electoral office should send an polling station official, along with a police officer, to your house and have you vote there in person.

...(long trumpian nonsense about America)...

Do you think that electoral fraud is composed only by ebul folks intercepting mail?
Electoral fraud happens when the secrecy of the vote is violated. Which happens quite happily if you are allowed to vote inside your house, where your relatives can know what you voted. Or threaten you or trick you into voting for someone. Or even worse, in hospitals.

[Vassenor]

...(long trumpian nonsense about America)...

Do you think that electoral fraud is composed only by ebul folks intercepting mail?
Electoral fraud happens when the secrecy of the vote is violated. Which happens quite happily if you are allowed to vote inside your house, where your relatives can know what you voted. Or threaten you or trick you into voting for someone. Or even worse, in hospitals.

So let's see evidence of this vote rigging then.

[San Lumen]

Why have mandatory turnout but not mandatory voting.

Voting is a right which means you also have a right not to exercise that right and that includes not showing up a polling site.

Showing up at a polling site isn’t voting

You should not be required to show up.

[El Lazaro]

Showing up at a polling site isn’t voting

You should not be required to show up.

That’s your opinion