@mystery-ak@Cyber Liberty@roamer_1 @libertybele @txradioguy @bigheadfred @edpc (Hmm, let's do this - with another election approaching, if I need to write more about the election process, which I will have to do as wrong information gets to the public, if you want me to ping you to those posts, send me a PM now and I will include you.)
That headline is another misleading title. No mail-in ballot is rejected until an evaluation of the ballot materials is completed, including evaluating the voter signatures. I tell you at the bottom of this post why voting by mail is the most difficult way to vote.
VERIFYING BALLOTS VOTED BY MAIL IN TEXASThe law pertaining to the appointment of the Early Voting Ballot Board and the Signature Verification Committee, and how they work to validate all ballots by mail:
https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/EL/htm/EL.87.htmWithout going into detail as to how the Early Voting Ballot Board and the Signature Verification is put together, the members are half Democrats and half Republicans. The Judge of the board is a person of the party of which the Governor was elected in the last Gubernatorial election. So, at this time, every Texas Judge of the EVBB or SVC in every county is a Republican as Governor Abbott is a Republican.
The appointed Early Voting Ballot Board (EVBB) or an appointed Signature Verification Committee (SVC) may validate the voter’s signature. In smaller counties, the EVBB usually does this along with their other duties verifying ballots by mail. In larger counties, say 4.70 million in Harris County (Houston area) a SVC is usually appointed for this reason: every mail in ballot requires validating signatures so the separate SVC takes that
one burden off the EVBB
There is one caveat pertaining to this:
If there is a separate SVC, they do their work before the EVBB meets and give their report of ballots rejected due to non-matching signatures, to the EVBB. The EVBB can and does, also compare those rejected signatures and if they determine by examination and vote, the signatures are the same, that ballot is returned to the accepted voter signature stack of ballots. This, then, is an added second evaluation of signatures to try to accept every ballot as valid.
Now, I will explain the parts of that law pertaining to validating the voter’s signature and why we do that. Let’s determine what voter signature the law says we have to validate:
“Sec. 87.027(i) The signature verification committee shall compare the signature on each carrier envelope certificate, except those signed for a voter by a witness, with the signature on the voter's ballot application to determine whether the signatures are those of the voter.â€
Have you voted by mail? You sent in an application for a mail ballot and signed it. That white application, which you signed, once your yellow ballot envelope which you signed, gets back to the county, is attached to the yellow envelope and given to the EVBB or SVC. Those are the two signatures compared.
There is one exception and that is when you are not able to sign your signature on the application and the yellow envelope, and a witness signs for you, the two signatures are not compared. However, if a witness does sign, and/or helps you fill out the ballot, the witness
must provide his/her name and address or the ballot is rejected.
Next, if the two signatures are not alike, the EVBB or SVC does this:
“The committee may also compare the signatures with any two or more signatures of the voter made within the preceding six years and on file with the county clerk or voter registrar to determine whether the signatures are those of the voter.â€
This is another check to try to accept the mail ballot. My board did this when there was a question about signatures not matching. A voter signs when he/she applies to be a voter and that document is kept, so we compared that signature with the ones on the yellow envelope and white application, plus any other voter signature kept by the county for the last six years.
When this process has finished comparing signatures for a ballot, the EVBB or SVC takes a vote whether or not to accept this ballot. And, as noted above, the EVBB can reconsider, reevaluate, signatures the SVC rejected.
Once the EVBB is finished with their work evaluating every mail ballot, the ones rejected get a letter from the Judge of the EVBB, describing why their mail ballot was rejected. That was my job. I mailed those letters one or two days after election day. They have to be mailed by 10 days later, but I got them out as soon as I could. Yes, my phone number was on those letters, and I got calls from some of them, but not one complained, they just wanted to discuss more about what they did and what they could do next time to prevent their ballot not getting counted.
One time during those years, I wrote an article for the local paper instructing people how to vote by mail so their ballot would not be rejected. Voting by mail is the most difficult way to vote; there are too many ways to “screw up†those required documents to vote by mail . I urged them to go to the polls in early voting if they possibly could.