Will coronavirus outbreak mean more Missourians can cast absentee ballots?
In Missouri, voters only have six allowable excuses for casting an absentee ballot — including being too sick to vote, being out of town on Election Day or in prison.
But with just three weeks to go before local elections in Missouri, Americans are being asked to avoid crowds and stay home because of the spread of coronavirus. That includes Kansas City and Jackson County, where voters are scheduled to weigh in on tax increases, school board openings and city council elections.
Is fear of coronavirus enough to qualify someone to vote absentee?
Opinions on that question vary.
Corey Dillon, director of the Jackson County Election Board, said that as it stands now “fear of contracting or spreading the COVID-19 virus is not a legal reason to vote absentee in Missouri.”
Eric Fey, Democratic director of elections for the St. Louis County Election Board, disagrees.
“If a voter expects to be prevented from going to polls because of this virus then that probably qualifies them for absentee voting,” he said.
Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft, the Republican whose office oversees elections in Missouri, said through a spokeswoman that he and his staff have been in daily contact with local election authorities about a range of topics, including absentee voting.
But he would not address the question of whether a healthy voter who is afraid of spreading Covid-19 can legally cast an absentee ballot.
“The law states valid reasons for voting absentee, and it is not up to our office to determine,” said Maura Browning, Ashcroft’s communications director. “The SOS office doesn’t – and the secretary doesn’t – interpret law.”
Missouri law says requests for absentee ballots must be received by 5 p.m. on the Wednesday prior to Election Day if the ballot is to be mailed.
For the April 7 election, that means March 25.
The deadline for absentee voting in person in the office of the local election authority is 5 p.m. on the day before the election.
But the worldwide coronavirus outbreak could shake up the election timetable.
The directors of the Jackson County Election Board asked the Western District Court of Appeals this week to allow the April 7 election to be pushed back to June 2. The petition to the court was co-signed by 45 other counties in the court’s jurisdiction.
“As it stands, we are doing our best to continue to work toward an April 7 election just in case this is not approved,” Dillon said.
The Eastern District Court of Appeals on Tuesday refused to allow St. Louis County to move their scheduled April 7 election to April 28 and to allow vote by mail.
The court said that while the coronavirus emergency is adequate justification for moving the date of voting, state law doesn’t allow for a mail-in election. The court also rejected the county’s proposal to move everything on the April 7 ballot to the Aug. 4 statewide primary election ballot.
Rick Watson, Henry County Clerk and president of the Missouri Association of County Clerks and Election Authorities, said his organization has been trying unsuccessfully for years to change the law to allow for no-excuse absentee voting.
Emotional distress can be classified as an illness, Watson said, and illness is one of the excuses allowed by law to cast an absentee ballot.
Buchanan County Clerk Mary Baack-Garvey is among those who hopes the court will allow local elections to be pushed to June 2. But regardless, “with this special circumstance that we are amidst of, I would allow someone who was very nervous about going out to the polls to vote absentee.”
Fey said that the question of whether or not someone could cast an absentee ballot out of fear of coronavirus is better posed to county prosecutors, who would be faced with whether to file charges.
According to the secretary of state’s office, illegally casting an absentee ballot is a class C felony.
A spokesman for Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker could not be immediately reached for comment.
Charles Hatfield, a Jefferson City attorney who previously worked under former Democratic Attorney General Jay Nixon, said state law was likely intended to mean that the person who is voting absentee must themselves be ill, “but we have never encountered a situation like this.”
“I believe a court might interpret the statute to allow absentee voting as a result of the illness of others,” he said, “particularly given the states of emergency that have been issued by the governor and various local officials.”
If people want to sign an affidavit saying they will be absent from the polls because the government is asking them not to go out into crowd, Hatfield said, most election authorities should allow them to cast an absentee ballot.
