Will USPS Delivery Delays Affect The 2024 Election?
R. Michael Alvarez
In a paper that is forthcoming in the Journal of Politics (preprint here), Yimeng Li and I found that universal voting-by-mail can increase voter participation (in the unique situation we studied in Southern California in March 2020, we estimated that turnout increased by 3-4 percent for voters who did not typically receive a mail ballot).
I got concerned, though, about voting-by-mail in this election when I read in the New York Times that recently mail delivery performance by the USPS has declined recently, and that it has declined significantly in some battleground states.
Here’s the topline performance statistics reported in the NYT article:
“From April through June, the agency delivered 80.5 percent of single-piece first-class letters and postcards on time, which is the mail category that households use most often. That is down from 86.8 percent during the same period last year and below the agency’s current target of 92.3 percent, according to Postal Service data. On-time delivery has climbed to 84.3 percent as of the week ending Aug. 16.”
Apparently in Georgia, where the USPS recently opened a new processing facility, the NYT reported that the on-time delivery rate had dropped to as low as 35.8% in March of this year, but the good news is that in Atlanta the on-time delivery rate in August of this year had improved to 84.9%. But note that means that about 15% of mail delivered in Atlanta is arriving late.
This situation will require continued observation and study by researchers. It’s great that the USPS has established a relatively easy-to-use dashboard where data on their service performance can be quickly visualized. This may allow researchers to study in detail whether the USPS delivery performance affects vote-by-mail performance throughout the nation, in universal vote-by-mail states, and in battleground states.
Most importantly, if you are a voter who places to cast your vote by mail, what should you do?
Make sure now that you are registered to vote and that your mailing address is listed correctly in your registration record. Most states and election jurisdictions have portals where you can check your registration status and registration information.
If you are in a jurisdiction where you need to request your vote-by-mail ballot, do so as early as possible. Check your jurisdiction’s deadlines on their website, and get your application in as soon as possible.
If you live in a place where you automatically will receive your ballot in the mail, check in with your jurisdiction to see when the ballots will be mailed, and monitor your mail box for your ballot.
If you don’t get your ballot by mail in a timely manner, check in with your election jurisdiction to confirm that your ballot was sent. Many jurisdictions will let you sign up for a ballot tracking service, and if you are lucky enough to be in one of those jurisdictions, sign up as soon as possible for the service, and track your ballot.
If you are returning your ballot by mail, get it back to the USPS as soon as you can to insure that it will be delivered to your election officials before their deadlines for receipt and processing.
If you are contacted by your election officials because of an issue with your vote-by-mail ballot, make sure to work with them to get those issues resolved quickly.
As the Caltech/MIT Voting Technology Project has been advising for some time, voters should be proactive when it comes to voting-by-mail. Voting by mail is convenient and accessible for many voters, but make sure that you get your ballot on time, and make sure that it gets returned to your election official in time to be included in the tabulation. Following the simple steps above can help make sure that your vote-by-mail ballot is counted in November.