The Vote And Voting Problems, Pre-Election Day 2020

A Michigan judge last night struck down a directive from the Michigan secretary of state that prohibited the open carry of firearms near polling locations and absentee counting boards on Election Day. (State laws that ban concealed carry at certain locations, such as schools or churches, will remain in effect.) State Attorney General Dana Nessel said her office would appeal the decision.

Conversation around voter intimidation has taken on new urgency this cycle. While experts in election law and in armed groups told FiveThirtyEight’s Maggie Koerth they don’t believe the risk of armed or threatening poll disruptors is the greatest threat to the election, they pointed out that the fear of voter intimidation could, itself, intimidate voters.

Another day, another late-night court ruling. Just now, the Texas Supreme Court ruled in favor of Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s executive order that counties may have only one ballot drop site each — reversing a lower court ruling that had said counties could set up multiple drop sites. Voting-rights advocates had been pushing for more drop sites in large counties like Harris and Travis, which are home to millions of people (many of them Democrats).

As Maya mentioned earlier, a big concern this year is that a large number of mail ballots will be thrown out because of issues with voters’ signatures. However, a federal judge is now preventing South Carolina from discounting any ballots solely because of perceived signature mismatches. State officials in Pennsylvania had also previously told counties that they could not throw out any ballots because of mismatched signatures.