The age of brass. Or the triumphs of woman's rights. Print shows women lining up at a ballot box. A man, on the far right, is holding a baby at the end of the line. Contributor Currier & Ives.Created / Published[New York] : Currier & Ives, 1869

By: Elaine S. Povich, Stateline, an initiative of The Pew Charitable Trusts

The cumbersome and sometimes slow counting of an expected record number of mail-in ballots — especially in some crucial swing states — could delay results and open the door to challenges in this year’s elections.

In 13 states and the District of Columbia, including the closely contested battlegrounds of Pennsylvania and Michigan, election officials can’t start processing absentee ballots until Election Day, and in three more states they can’t start until the polls close. With millions of such ballots anticipated, that’s a daunting, if not impossible, task to perform quickly.

And with many more voters using mail-in ballots for the first time, mistakes such as failing to sign the envelope or sending it too late likely will lead to a larger share of rejected ballots.

The possible result: vote counts that aren’t complete for days or even weeks, creating an opportunity for candidates, parties, members of the media or others to sow doubts about the legitimacy of the process.

Election officials and lawmakers in some states, including Michigan and Pennsylvania, are trying to alter counting procedures to avoid that outcome. But time is running short to alter the rules, and changing election procedures on the fly may create confusion.

Some states already have updated their laws this year to permit tabulation before polls close on Election Day, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures (NSCL). Delaware enacted legislation allowing tabulation to begin on the 30th of the month preceding the election through Election Day, but only for 2020. Louisiana enacted a law allowing parishes with more than 1,000 voters to process absentee ballots the day before Election Day and tabulate ballots on Election Day before polls close.

County commissioners in Pennsylvania, which doesn’t allow processing of absentee ballots until Election Day, are pushing the legislature to set a 21-day “pre-canvass period” during which they could verify bar code and voter information on envelopes and remove and flatten the ballots. 

“Opening all of them on Election Day while we are still trying to administer an in-person vote is challenging,” said Lisa Schaefer, executive director of the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania, which is leading the effort. “Only allowing us to begin that work on Election Day makes it very likely we will not have results available on election night.”

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