Voting Access (H 7200 A, H 7896, H 8102 A, S 2598 A)

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, voters could face significant health risks during the Rhode Island state primary in September and the general election in November if no alterations are made to our current voting process. In early July, in an attempt to address these concerns, several pieces of legislation – some good, some bad – were introduced in both chambers of the legislature. The ACLU of RI testified in conjunction with 15 other organizations on these pieces of legislation which are detailed below.

H 7200 A – This critical piece of legislation would make changes to the mail ballot process to mirror the conduct of the Presidential Preference Primary election in June by requiring the Secretary of State to automatically send mail ballot applications to all registered voters in Rhode Island for both the September state primary and the November general election, waiving the notary and two witness signature requirement for mail ballots, and requiring the installation of statewide drop boxes at which voters could submit their mail ballot. However, in light of the fact that nearly 3,000 ballots were not counted in the Presidential Preference Primary because they arrived by mail too late, we additionally proposed an amendment to the legislation which would include a three-day grace period for all ballots postmarked by Election Day to be counted, even if they arrive late. The House passed this legislation but died in the Senate.  

H 7896  – We opposed this legislation due to serious deficiencies in the changes to the emergency mail ballot procedure which this bill proposed, including a voter ID requirement which is stricter than our current voter ID requirements and  an inappropriate shrinking of the time frame that a voter would have to cast their emergency mail ballot. The concerns we expressed about this legislation were addressed in H 8102 A.

H 8102 A – We supported this legislation because it provides a positive alternate process to those who wish to cast their emergency mail ballot prior to Election Day by allowing a voter to fill out their emergency mail ballot application on an electronic poll book and then cast a regular ballot which will be placed directly into the tabulator. This legislation has been signed by the Governor into law.

S 2598 A – While the original version of this bill would have limited ballot access for voters, these objections were satisfied by the Sub A version of the legislation. Similar to H 8102 A, this bill provides a positive alternate process to those who wish to cast their emergency mail ballot prior to Election Day by allowing a voter to fill out their emergency mail ballot application on an electronic poll book and then cast a regular ballot which will be placed directly into the tabulator. However, this legislation leaves in place the notary and two witness signature requirement for the submission of a mail ballot which could disenfranchise voters who live alone, are disabled, or are otherwise unable to fulfill these requirements. We encouraged amendments which would match the changes made in H 7200 A, which would waive these requirements and additionally provide a grace period for the receipt of mail ballots postmarked by Election Day. This bill has been signed by the Governor into law without the inclusion of our suggested amendments.