In Navajo County, around 1,300 ballots were returned to the post office in this year’s primary election. An investigation found that there was nothing unusual about this high number. The large return in ballots was credited to voters’ addresses being changed without updating their voting information, according to Votebeat.
Sasha Hupka, a reporter for Votebeat, joined “Arizona Horizon” to explain the issue that garnered national attention.
Hupka explained that ballots must be sent by nonforwardable mail, which means that USPS cannot forward a ballot to people who moved or left town for the summer. However, those people can still vote in-person and remain on the voter list.
After the undelivered ballots was reported, there was a national outcry that the Navajo people were disenfranchised. Hupka said she is not sure that is the case.
“Most of these people were out of town,” she said. “You’re looking at a summer primary, and that’s a period where a lot of Arizonans leave to escape the heat.
Hupka said that since those voters were still eligible to cast their ballots in person, disenfranchisement is probably not the case.
“These undeliverable ballots, although they aren’t the best case scenario, there are valid reasons for them that aren’t people are being disenfranchised and USPS is purposefully withholding them,” Hupka said.
She also said the situation resulted in Navajo County reaching out personally to voters whose ballots were marked undeliverable, inquiring about updated addresses and informing them that their ballot cannot be forwarded.
Hupka also discussed an anti-voting fraud law Gov. Doug Ducey signed in 2021 that will go into effect next year, which states people who have not voted in the previous two election cycles will be taken off the automatic early voting list.
The Brennan Center for Justice conducted a study after the law passed that found nearly 340,000 Arizonans could be taken off the early voting list, Hupka said.
“The important thing to note here is that being taken off the early voting list does not equate to being taken off the voter roll,” she said. “These people will still be able to vote, but they will not receive an early mail ballot.”
County officials are mandated to send a notice before a voter is taken off the automatic early voting list, to which the voter can respond with their current address and signature to get back on the list. If voters do not respond, they can also rejoin the list later on, Hupka said.
“When we look at other states that have enacted similar laws to this, is that a lot of times voters don’t do that,” she said. “We see a lot of states that have had similar laws where it’s really changed the voting behavior or meant that some voters just stopped voting.”
