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Editor’s Note: This story is part of Cascadia Daily News’ mini-series “pre-bunking” misinformation and disinformation ahead of the 2024 election. The series will continue to explore the democratic process in Whatcom County.
Washington voters have been dropping their ballots in mailboxes for nearly two decades and the process has proven to be accurate and secure, experts say.
Whatcom County was one of the first counties in Washington to allow vote-by-mail when the state Legislature established it as a permanent part of the election process in 2005, explained Whatcom County Chief Deputy Auditor Amy Grasher, who was the elections supervisor for the previous 12 years.
At the time, it was a decision made county by county.
Then, in 2011, the Legislature required all counties to provide universal vote-by-mail — a system where every registered voter gets sent a ballot in the mail. It’s a system that election experts say increases turnout, without providing a distinct advantage to any political party.
“Voting by mail is accurate, secure, accessible and transparent,” Whatcom County Auditor Stacy Henthorn said. “It’s convenient for voters and allows time to research contests and questions on the ballot before marking a choice.”
While Washingtonians are accustom to the vote-by-mail process, many voters in the U.S. were first introduced to the option during the pandemic in a torrent of election misinformation and disinformation. about the process.
Every active registered voter in Whatcom County is sent a ballot, secrecy envelope and return envelope in the mail ahead of an election. Each return envelope is printed with a unique barcode, which is its ballot ID number.
“That is how we track ballots through the whole process,” Grasher said. However, she noted that once a return envelope with a ballot is accepted, signature confirmed as a match and processed, it is separated from the envelope to ensure anonymity.
The ballots are also given a “status,” which moves to “sent” once it’s been issued to a registered voter.
If a person requests a replacement ballot, they’re going to end up with two ballots having been issued to them.
“The first one issued will go from ‘sent’ to ‘suspended’ and the current ballot will be marked as ‘sent,’” Grasher explained. “If I’m issued three ballots, the first two will be suspended and the most recent one will be marked as sent.”
A ballot’s status can be changed to suspended for a variety of reasons, including a change to the person’s voter registration, the voter dying before casting their ballot or a change in address. Requests can be made online at VoteWA.gov.
Ballots returned by mail — just under 30% in Whatcom County in 2022 — are collected by a team of two election workers from a secure location in the post office every day. They are then taken back to the Election Center to be processed.
In cases where multiple ballots are mailed out to a single voter — such as an address change — only the first ballot returned on time with a signature that matches the one on file with the Washington Voter Registration database will be accepted and counted.
If the address change puts the voter in a new precinct with a different ballot style, they will receive the proper ballot at their new address and the previous ballot will be rejected.
Seven days after Election Day, election officials research ballots rejected for “Ballot Style Change.” If the voter hasn’t returned their current ballot, the ballot rejected for ballot style change will be counted. However, only the contests and questions that apply to their new precinct will be counted, Hawthorn explained.
“If any election mail is sent to your address in the name of someone who doesn’t reside with you, please write ‘return to sender’ or ‘not at this address’ on the envelope, and put it back in the mail,” Henthorn said.
Confidence and trust levels in the vote-by-mail system are relatively high in Washington because it’s something voters are familiar with, explained Madeline Jalbert, postdoctoral scholar at University of Washington Center for an Informed Public.
“People are used to mail in voting, so they expect to vote by mail,” Jalbert said.
More than 70% of Washington voters have a high or moderate trust in the vote-by-mail system, according to a 2022 SurveyUSA poll.
The poll found that 43% of voters had a high confidence in vote-by-mail elections, while 28% had moderate trust in the system.
For the majority of registered voters in Washington, their trust in the state’s vote-by-mail system has not changed since 2022, according to a 2024 survey. However, 20% of voters said their trust in the system had increased, while 21% of the 801 voters surveyed said their confidence had decreased.
“The Auditor’s Office staff are committed and driven by integrity and accuracy,” Henthorn said. “Collectively we possess many years of experience running elections. We strive to make the process more efficient, more accessible and more transparent to our voters.”
On Friday, Aug. 2, four days before the primary, more than 61.5% of ballots cast were returned by mail in Washington, according to the data from the Secretary of State’s Office.
“If you return your ballot in the mail, it has to be postmarked by Election Day,” Grasher said.
More information can be found on Washington’s Secretary of State’s Office website addressing frequently asked vote-by-mail questions.
Previous stories in CDN’s election mini-series
- Meet Washington’s robust voter registration system
- Secure election system in Whatcom County open to voters
Isaac Stone Simonelli is CDN’s enterprise/investigations reporter; reach him at isaacsimonelli@cascadiadaily.com; 360-922-3090 ext. 127.
