{"id":29415,"date":"2020-10-10T10:22:44","date_gmt":"2020-10-10T15:22:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/?p=29415"},"modified":"2020-10-10T10:23:58","modified_gmt":"2020-10-10T15:23:58","slug":"without-secrecy-sleeves-your-mail-in-ballot-might-not-count","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/2020\/10\/10\/without-secrecy-sleeves-your-mail-in-ballot-might-not-count\/","title":{"rendered":"Without secrecy sleeves, your mail-in ballot might not count"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"border: 1px solid #e6e6e6;\" src=\"https:\/\/wusa9.com\/embeds\/video\/65-1a7633b4-47b5-47dd-a826-10a88382b9c3\/iframe\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><em>Forget to put your ballot inside these sleeves, and in some states your vote won\u2019t count. On top of that, your ballot may be visible to anybody.<\/em><\/p>\n<div class=\"article__section article__section_type_text utility__text\">\n<p>FAIRFAX COUNTY, Va. \u2014 10\/09\/20 &#8211; Many voters will trust the US Postal Service to get their ballots to county officials on time for the 2020 election.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"article__section article__section_type_text utility__text\">\n<p>Virginia ballots are inside two envelopes, labeled \u201cA\u201d and \u201cB.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"article__section article__section_type_text utility__text\">\n<p>The &#8220;A&#8221; envelope directs the US Postal Service to get the ballot to the right place. It\u2019s the critical \u201cB\u201d envelope, something called a secrecy sleeve, that validates the voter\u2019s identity, according to Virginia law.<\/p>\n<div class=\"article__section article__section_type_text utility__text\">\n<p>&#8220;It\u2019s really the same information, but we\u2019re getting it in the voter\u2019s handwriting and their signature attesting they are the voter who requested it,&#8221; explained Fairfax County registrar Gary Scott.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"article__section article__section_type_text utility__text\">\n<p>Scott has<a href=\"https:\/\/www.fairfaxcounty.gov\/publicaffairs\/gary-scott-appointed-fairfax-countys-general-registrar\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u00a022 years experience\u00a0<\/a>helping to run Fairfax County elections, but never one where mail-in ballots were so popular.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"article__section article__section_type_text utility__text\">\n<p>&#8220;The outer envelope has a bar code which allows us to scan and identify the voter. Then, the &#8220;B&#8221; envelope will be separated from the outer envelope,&#8221; added Scott.<\/p>\n<div class=\"article__section article__section_type_text utility__text\">\n<p>16 states, including Virginia and West Virginia, have laws mandating secrecy sleeves,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncsl.org\/research\/elections-and-campaigns\/vopp-table-13-states-that-are-required-to-provide-secrecy-sleeves-for-absentee-mail-ballots.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"article__section article__section_type_text utility__text\">\n<p>Ballots without the sleeves are called \u201cNaked Ballots.\u201d They were the target of a September lawsuit in election battleground Pennsylvania. Democrats sued the Republican legislature trying to change a law it passed and allow Naked Ballots to be counted. The lawsuit failed and the requirement stands \u2013 just as in Virginia. More at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wusa9.com\/article\/news\/politics\/elections\/without-secrecy-sleeves-your-ballot-not-so-secret\/65-0195282b-2092-4fd2-b207-36c291b70dfc\">WUSA 9<\/a><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-29352\" src=\"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/Mail-in-Voting2-300x176.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"176\" srcset=\"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/Mail-in-Voting2-300x176.jpg 300w, https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/Mail-in-Voting2.jpg 478w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Forget to put your ballot inside these sleeves, and in some states your vote won\u2019t count. On top of that, your ballot may be visible to anybody. FAIRFAX COUNTY, Va. \u2014 10\/09\/20 &#8211; Many voters will trust the US Postal Service to get their ballots to county officials on time for the 2020 election. Virginia [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29352,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29415","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-breaking","category-video-gallery","last_archivepost"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29415","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29415"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29415\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29417,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29415\/revisions\/29417"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}