Florida at the electoral epicenter: Dilemmas of voting by mail

With only weeks to go before the presidential election, Florida has become the key battleground stage between the two candidates. It is the center of the electoral media coverage, the territory where the most money is being spent on TV advertisements, and in practice it is a kind of ‘test laboratory’ promoting hatred, fear and political violence. South Florida, which is traditionally hit by hurricanes, now appears to be being hit with particular intensity by the ‘specter of communism.’

Without a doubt, Florida’s 29 electoral college votes place it as the pendulum state that can determine the outcome of the election. Therefore, both Trump and Biden will try to use all means at their disposal to impose themselves on the voters. Taking into account the different mathematical options each candidate has to achieve the 270 electoral college votes needed to win, one can say that Trump must win Florida to be re-elected. The historical evidence for this is overwhelming. Since 1924 no Republican candidate has reached the White House without winning Florida.

For Biden it is not essential to win Florida in order to become president. At this point he has more secure electoral college votes and exhibits a more favorable position than his opponent in several of the other decisive states. However, his campaign team is very active and in locked in trying to achieve victory in Florida in order to knock Trump out early and thereby securing him the presidency.

From that point of view, Republicans have concluded that in Florida they have no alternative but to use all options on the table. Under this premise, voting by mail constitutes one of its primary targets of attack for two fundamental reasons: it is one of the forms of voting that will have an exponential growth in millions of voters and the majority of the people who will use it will be registered Democrats. Therefore, the vote-by-mail numbers will not only be decisive in winning Florida, but could determine who the next president of the United States will be.

According to the Florida Division of Elections, 4.6 million mail-in ballots had been requested as of September 19. Of that total, 2.1 million were Democrats, or 46.5% of the requests. Republican requests for mail-in ballots amount to 1.4 million, and 970,000 requests were aligned with neither party. So as of that date, Democrats lead Republicans by 703,326 requested ballots.

If we take into account that until October 24 voters can request mail-in ballots, then we know that these figures will increase, doubling the 2.7 million mail-in ballots that were sent in the 2016 presidential election. In practical terms, it will be an avalanche that will overwhelm the organizational and logistical capacities of local election authorities, voting centers and the postal service. They will face an unknown and unprecedented scenario that may contribute to an increase in electoral irregularities and, in particular, will create favorable conditions for Republican maneuvers.

When voting by mail is exercised, situations may arise that result in ballots not being counted. The most frequent are: errors made by voters during the exercise of suffrage wherein ballots arrive at the voting centers after the established hours. Under Florida election law, mail-in votes cannot be counted if they arrive at the elections office on Election Day after 7 p.m.

Ballots arrive late when voters mail-in their vote on the same day of the election. This aspect, in these elections, will have a decisive impact not only because the U.S. Postal Service is not prepared to manage the millions of ballots expected, but because there is an explicit will of Republicans to substantially limit its operation as a way to suppress the Democrats’ vote.

According to Politico, in the primary elections held in Florida in August, more than 35,000 ballots sent by mail were not counted. Most were rejected, not because of voters’ mistakes, but because they arrived after the deadline. In those elections, 60 percent of the vote was by mail and the Democrats represented 50 percent of those voters, and contributed 47 percent of the ballots that were not counted.

According to Daniel Smith, a professor at Florida International University (FIU) and an expert on electoral issues, this figure demonstrates that in November there may be a big problem when this type of vote increases substantially. He added: “We could exceed 100,000 ballots by mail that are not counted.” If we take into account that Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton in 2016 in this state by 112,911 votes, then there is a real possibility that in this election the votes by mail that are not counted could make a difference in the dispute for the 29 electoral college votes.

Taking as a reference Smith’s own exhaustive investigation of the rejected ballots in Florida during the 2016 and 2018 elections, the main causes of annulment were: the voter’s signature did not exactly match the one on record; the ballot was not signed; and the signature was not signed within the established box. Between the two elections, more than 58,000 were declared invalid.

According to the study, the largest percentage of voided ballots come from young voters, ages 18-21; voters with disabilities requiring assistance; Hispanics; and African Americans. That is, the numbers fall in a segment of the population predominantly Democrat. Among the counties with the highest rejection rates are Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach (where the largest percentage of Florida Democrats live).

Throughout this process of certifying the validity of the mail-in ballot, a fundamental role is played by the board of review at the county level, which has the power to annul these types of votes. In practice, this electoral authority has wide discretionary powers and the decisions of its members can have a significant impact on the election.

The complexity of the prevailing political climate in Florida — Republican control of the governor’s chair and both state chambers — as well as its political machine in the state, are factors that the Trump campaign could take advantage of to influence the performance of election officials. The atmosphere of chaos, confusion and uncertainty is already present and is national in scope. Therefore, it has been erected as the natural environment of the elections.

Furthermore, state regulations allow so-called ‘election observers’ to participate during the verification process of ballots by mail, and may even question their validity. It is known that the Republicans will deploy this type of person in the voting centers that are considered key. Undoubtedly, these means of intimidation will be intensified in Florida, constituting a source of tension and confrontations.

The FIU professor’s investigation reaches a very illustrative conclusion: “Our study only shows the tip of the iceberg because it is limited to voided ballots, but does not include those that arrive after 7 p.m.” Precisely one of the pillars on which the Republican strategy rests is to undermine the functioning of the postal service in such a way that tens of thousands of ballots do not arrive on time, and in the worst of circumstances are not even delivered to the supervisor of elections office. Local authorities, themselves, are urging voters to return their vote-by-mail at least 10 days before November 3. Otherwise, they may not be counted.

Given the vulnerabilities of vote-by-mail and the opportunities in Florida for Republicans to influence this process, Democrats are forced to mobilize and navigate several obstacles.

In essence, the success of the candidates in Florida is conditioned by the behavior of two opposing variables. In the case of Trump, it will be the ability of his campaign team and supporters to suppress the vote of the Democratic base using the premise that “the end justifies the means.” Biden, on the other hand, will depend on generating an avalanche of voters motivated fundamentally to cast their vote against the current U.S. president regardless of whether or not they sympathize with the Democratic Party candidate.

We cannot rule out that this scenario may occur, but if we are guided exclusively by the polls we will never really know what the true possibilities are because the majority of those voters may not be under consideration in the sample of surveys we are seeing. The current reality in the United States is complex and uncertain. It is also what may provoke a wave of voters against Trump on November 3rd.