Johnson County voters are suspicious of vote-by-mail ballot requests. Should they be?
Johnson County resident Bill Brewer was attempting to put a completed mail-in ballot application from the Center for Voter Information into the return envelope when he became suspicious.
First, the envelope seemed too small for the application. Then he noticed the sender’s address was in Springfield, Missouri, but the Kansas Secretary of State was typed at the top of the application.
And finally he thought: “Wait, didn’t I already fill this out?”
Brewer had already completed an application with his county election office. He is among many Kansans who have been confused by, and concerned about, a vote-by-mail ballot application from the CVI that recently landed in their mailbox.
Some Kansans who received the items in the mail worried that it was an attempt at voter fraud.
Nathan Carter, office administrator for the Johnson County Election Office, said the agency received many calls from residents concerned about that.
But he assured them that the application is legitimate.
Ahead of elections, it’s not uncommon for organizations, campaigns or political parties to send out mailers like one from CVI, a non-partisan, non-profit organization out of Washington D.C., Carter said.
Much of the confusion he’s hearing is from some of the 100,000 Johnson County residents who requested mail ballots ahead of receiving the CVI application.
If you already registered to vote by mail through the county, you do not have to do so again, Carter said. But if you would like to register and haven’t yet, the Johnson County election office will process applications from the CVI mailers.
This month, CVI sent more than 455,000 vote-by-mail ballot applications to registered voters across Kansas, said the organization’s president and CEO, Tom Lopach.
“With COVID-19 impacting elections, we have a responsibility to do all we can to safely increase voter turnout amid this uncertain time,” Lopach said in a statement. “We feel it is vital to keep voters safe and to bring democracy to eligible voters’ doorsteps.”
The organization focuses in part on reaching “members of the Rising American Electorate” whom have been historically under-represented, he said. This includes people of color, young people and unmarried women.
So far this year in America, CVI has helped to generate more than 1.8 million applications to vote by mail, Lopach said.
When asked about the envelope size, a CVI spokesperson recommended the application be folded to fit the envelope. They said election officials are OK with the form being folded in this way.
For those who wish to apply using third parties, like CVI, deputy assistant secretary of state Katie Koupal cautions that voters make sure all the personal information pre-written into the form is accurate and up-to-date.
Koupal said third-party groups will occasionally send their applications to the secretary of state’s elections division to make sure they didn’t leave out anything important before sending them to the public.
CVI was one of those organizations, she said. After a review, it appeared they included all the information required by Kansas law.
“But we don’t approve them, we don’t reject them, and it’s nothing they’re required to do,” she said of third-parties. “If they send it to us, we’re always happy to take a look at it, but that is not us endorsing their activities.”
Though state law doesn’t prohibit third-party mailers, Koupal encourages voters to go through their local election office or online at sos.ks.gov.
“When in doubt, we just encourage folks to go through government resources rather than third-party.”
Kansans can apply through the county at voter.jocoelection.org and track their advance voting application at myvoteinfo.voteks.org/voterview.
