Fact or Fiction: Absentee Ballots Don't Count Unless..

Vote by Mail and Absentee rumorsHere's one strange rumor that's going around. An LAist reader was told that her absentee ballot will not count unless it is needed in a tie breaker situation.

"Oh, that's not true," Eileen Shea of the LA County Recorder Register/County Clerk's Office said of absentee ballots, which are actually called Vote by Mail ballots in California. "Vote by Mail ballots all count. Everything we get in by Vote by Mail, we count at 8:00 p.m. on election night--they are the first to be run through."

If you have any election related questions, feel free to comment. We'll try our best to hunt down an answer for you.

Photo by aflcio2008 via Flickr

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Comments (9) [rss]

Ahhh...vindication. SUCK IT, Joe & Oz!!! HAHAHAHAHA!!!

(My apologies to the rest of the world.)

If I submitted a vote-by-mail application a couple weeks ago and still haven't received a ballot, where is the best place to inquire about my voting status?

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It's the provisional ballots which are horrid, and not always counted. This month's Rolling Stone article is a good primer on some other voter suppression techniques.

Javajunkee,if you have applied for a mail in ballot and haven't received anything yet call 1-800-815-2666 and then choose option #4. They do ask that you give it a week but if it's been longer than that to call. www.lavote.net has a lot of information available including checking your registration status online.

Can I wear an Obama or McCain t-shirt to go vote?

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In all fairness the person may have confused absentee ballots that arrive by the election deadline with absentee ballots arriving after the election deadline, yet postmarked by a qualifying date.

re: voting in Obama and/or McCain shirts:

I saw a story on the news last night about a woman who went to vote early and was turned away because she had an Obama shirt on. They let her go out to her car and put it on inside-out and come back and vote. According to the report it falls under the category of campaigning within 100 feet of a polling place - which is a no-no.

I don't remember what state she was in (I don't think it was California) and it may vary from state to state....

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I live directly across a small street from my polling location. Is it OK to have an Obama sign on my lawn. I think its probably more than 100ft but not sure.

thanks flotorch... I ended up checking it out at lavote.net and it seems I must've submitted after the deadline. It's okay, my polling place is right around the corner from my house so I'll just tough it out and go in person :-)

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