{"id":38945,"date":"2026-01-28T11:55:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-28T16:55:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/?p=38945"},"modified":"2026-01-28T11:55:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T16:55:12","slug":"congressmen-introduce-vote-by-mail-tracking-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/2026\/01\/28\/congressmen-introduce-vote-by-mail-tracking-act\/","title":{"rendered":"Congressmen introduce Vote by Mail Tracking Act"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>WASHINGTON, D.C.\u00a0<\/strong>\u2013 1\/27\/26 &#8211; Today, U.S. Congressman Kweisi Mfume (D-MD-07) and U.S. Congressman Pete Sessions (R-TX-17) introduced bipartisan legislation to increase the transparency of mail-in ballots, boosting confidence in our elections and helping Americans verify that their votes are counted. The <em>Vote By Mail Tracking Act\u00a0<\/em>would add an official logo and standardized tracking barcodes to each mail-in ballot, allowing voters to track their ballot&#8217;s status.\u00a0<a class=\"ext\" title=\"https:\/\/iqconnect.house.gov\/iqextranet\/iqClickTrk.aspx?&amp;cid=MD07KM&amp;crop=17042QQQ12559733QQQ5413797QQQ84862741&amp;report_id=&amp;redirect=https%3a%2f%2fmfume.house.gov%2fmedia%2fpress-releases%2freps-mfume-porter-colleagues-introduce-bipartisan-bill-to-strengthen-transparency-of-mail-in-ballots&amp;redir_log=733379957871024 (opens in a new window)\" href=\"https:\/\/iqconnect.house.gov\/iqextranet\/iqClickTrk.aspx?&amp;cid=MD07KM&amp;crop=17042QQQ12559733QQQ5413797QQQ84862741&amp;report_id=&amp;redirect=https%3a%2f%2fmfume.house.gov%2fmedia%2fpress-releases%2freps-mfume-porter-colleagues-introduce-bipartisan-bill-to-strengthen-transparency-of-mail-in-ballots&amp;redir_log=733379957871024\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow noreferrer\" data-extlink=\"\">Congressman Mfume co-led the introduction of this bill in September 2023<\/a>, during the 118th Congress, and\u00a0<a class=\"ext\" title=\"https:\/\/iqconnect.house.gov\/iqextranet\/iqClickTrk.aspx?&amp;cid=MD07KM&amp;crop=17042QQQ12559733QQQ5413797QQQ84862741&amp;report_id=&amp;redirect=https%3a%2f%2fmfume.house.gov%2fmedia%2fpress-releases%2fvote-by-mail-tracking-act-passes-house-with-broad-bipartisan-support&amp;redir_log=12983926256799 (opens in a new window)\" href=\"https:\/\/iqconnect.house.gov\/iqextranet\/iqClickTrk.aspx?&amp;cid=MD07KM&amp;crop=17042QQQ12559733QQQ5413797QQQ84862741&amp;report_id=&amp;redirect=https%3a%2f%2fmfume.house.gov%2fmedia%2fpress-releases%2fvote-by-mail-tracking-act-passes-house-with-broad-bipartisan-support&amp;redir_log=12983926256799\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow noreferrer\" data-extlink=\"\">it later passed the House with overwhelming bipartisan support by a vote of 396-6.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cOver 47 million Americans voted by mail in the last General Election, and those voters deserve to know that their ballots have been delivered and counted. This common-sense legislation will help voters track their mail-in ballots at every stage of delivery and will aid in election administration \u2013 thereby strengthening the electoral process as a whole. I am proud to reintroduce this bipartisan legislation and urge its passage to help give each voter peace of mind over the status of their mail-in ballots,\u201d\u00a0<strong>said Congressman Kweisi Mfume.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u201cFree, fair, and transparent elections are fundamental to our democracy, and Texans expect their government to get this right,\u201d\u00a0<strong>said Congressman Pete Sessions<\/strong>. \u201cI am proud to co-lead the reintroduction of the Vote by Mail Tracking Act to bring greater accountability, reliability, and confidence to the vote-by-mail process. This bipartisan legislation builds on overwhelming support from the last Congress and implements commonsense safeguards, like ballot tracking and clear Postal Service standards, to ensure every lawful vote is handled securely and responsibly for voters in Texas and across the nation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The\u00a0<em>Vote by Mail Tracking Act<\/em>\u00a0would help voters track their ballots and have confidence that election officials count their votes. Under this bill, each mail-in ballot envelope must:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Contain a United States Postal Service (USPS) barcode;<\/li>\n<li>Meet USPS design requirements and standards for machinable letters; and<\/li>\n<li>Include the Official Election Mail logo.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Some states already have ballot tracking systems available for voters to use, but in other states it can be hard to verify if a ballot arrives on time. This bill would make transparency the standard nationwide so every eligible voter trusts that their vote is safely received and processed.\u00a0<strong>The\u00a0<\/strong><em><strong>Vote by Mail Tracking Act<\/strong><\/em><strong>\u00a0is cosponsored by 25 Members of Congress and endorsed by the National Association of Postal Supervisors.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Click\u00a0<\/strong><a class=\"ext\" title=\"https:\/\/iqconnect.house.gov\/iqextranet\/iqClickTrk.aspx?&amp;cid=MD07KM&amp;crop=17042QQQ12559733QQQ5413797QQQ84862741&amp;report_id=&amp;redirect=https%3a%2f%2fmfume.house.gov%2fsites%2fevo-subsites%2fmfume.house.gov%2ffiles%2fevo-media-document%2fvote-by-mail-tracking-act_119.pdf&amp;redir_log=807597881805806 (opens in a new window)\" href=\"https:\/\/iqconnect.house.gov\/iqextranet\/iqClickTrk.aspx?&amp;cid=MD07KM&amp;crop=17042QQQ12559733QQQ5413797QQQ84862741&amp;report_id=&amp;redirect=https%3a%2f%2fmfume.house.gov%2fsites%2fevo-subsites%2fmfume.house.gov%2ffiles%2fevo-media-document%2fvote-by-mail-tracking-act_119.pdf&amp;redir_log=807597881805806\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow noreferrer\" data-extlink=\"\"><strong>HERE<\/strong><\/a><strong>\u00a0to read the bill&#8217;s full text.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/PEN-NEWS.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-29060 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/PEN-NEWS-300x176.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"176\" srcset=\"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/PEN-NEWS-300x176.jpg 300w, https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/PEN-NEWS.jpg 478w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>WASHINGTON, D.C.\u00a0\u2013 1\/27\/26 &#8211; Today, U.S. Congressman Kweisi Mfume (D-MD-07) and U.S. Congressman Pete Sessions (R-TX-17) introduced bipartisan legislation to increase the transparency of mail-in ballots, boosting confidence in our elections and helping Americans verify that their votes are counted. The Vote By Mail Tracking Act\u00a0would add an official logo and standardized tracking barcodes to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29060,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-breaking","last_archivepost"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38945","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=38945"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38945\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38946,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38945\/revisions\/38946"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38945"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38945"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}