Kansas politicians want to remove ballot drop boxes. That hurts your right to vote
My views on voting are straightforward: It should be easy for every eligible voter to securely cast a ballot and have it counted. The good news is that is mostly the case in Kansas. Measures such as ballot drop boxes, advance voting and mail-in ballots have made voting more accessible, and Kansans are reaping the benefits. Our election commissioners and county clerks, combined with the dedication of our election workers, helped Kansas break voter turnout records in November 2020 — during a pandemic, no less. But despite this success, Republican politicians in Topeka are intent on changing our voting laws to make voting less accessible and the administration of elections more convoluted.
Take Senate Substitute for HB 2056. If enacted, this bill would disenfranchise tens of thousands of Kansas voters — especially rural, working-class and elderly voters — while providing no additional election security.
HB 2056 would eliminate the three-day grace period enacted in 2017 to account for slower mail delivery, particularly in rural Kansas. That provision, supported by all 24 of the current state senators who were in the Legislature at that time, allows ballots postmarked by 7:00 p.m. on Election Day and received by the election office by the close of business on Friday to be counted. This is common sense. Given that our mail goes out of state for processing, and the well-documented challenges of our postal system, the need for the grace period is even greater than when it was adopted. If the grace period were not in effect in November 2020, 32,647 duly cast votes would not have been counted.
In 2020, ballot drop boxes provided Kansans with a safe, convenient way to securely return their ballots. In fact, Secretary of State Scott Schwab told the Legislature that drop boxes are more reliable and secure than the mail. Despite their security, HB 2056 would limit counties to one drop box per 30,000 registered voters, eliminating 80 boxes across the state, including four in Wyandotte County. To put that in perspective, Kansas averaged one drop box per 10,000 voters in 2020. And only 10 of our 105 counties have more than 30,000 registered voters. Ultimately, the 40% reduction in the total number of drop boxes would mean that 48 counties — almost half — would have to reduce the number of drop boxes.
In addition, drop boxes would no longer be available to Kansans who want to drop off their ballot on their way to or from work, or over the weekend. The bill limits drop box access to hours when the county election office is open, eliminating them as a convenient option. For context, the Johnson and Wyandotte county election offices are open only from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Monday through Friday.
Our neighbors in Colorado have a better approach. Instead of capping drop boxes at one per 30,000 registered voters, Colorado requires at least one drop box for every 30,000 voters.
So why are politicians trying to fix a system that’s serving Kansans well? Best I can tell, it stems from an unwillingness to level with a small number of constituents who have been misinformed about the security of our elections. But what has been especially disappointing is having entire legislative committees handed over to conspiracy theorists.
Here’s what Kansans need to know: Our elections are secure. More than 300 audits have been conducted recently, with every county in Kansas passing and every legal ballot accounted for. The conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation recently named Kansas one of the top 15 states for election integrity. Simply put, there is zero evidence of voter fraud or ballot tampering in Kansas.
It’s time that politicians stop chasing imaginary voter fraud and making it harder to vote and start doing something more productive: encouraging all eligible voters to participate in our wonderful democratic process.