Quick Tip
- Counties in green had 100% of absentee ballots sent within selected timeframe.
- Analysis of absentee ballot processing times limited to mail absentee ballots only.
In Virginia, state law requires general registrars to process absentee ballot applications and mail ballots to all approved applicants within three days of receipt of the application. This visual provides detailed information regarding the number of absentee ballot applications processed and the number of days after receipt of an application that a voter is mailed a ballot.
Separately, federal law applies separate deadlines for applications from members of the military and certain overseas citizens. Both federal and state requirements are important to ensure that absentee voters receive their ballot in sufficient time to return their voted ballot by Election Day. The Department of Elections surveys localities before and after the deadline to mail absentee ballots to ensure compliance. ELECT works cooperatively with localities and provides assistance when issues arise that may impact the timely sending of absentee ballots.
In recent years, Virginia election officials have greatly improved compliance with these deadlines. In 2008, after the recount between Congressman Perriello and Congressman Goode in Virginia’s Fifth Congressional District where it was discovered that several absentee ballots were not sent by the mandated deadline, the State Board was named a defendant in litigation related to the localities’ noncompliance with these requirements. The litigation highlighted the Department’s role in this process and resulted in a consent decree requiring the Department to collect three “surveys” from each local election official where the general registrar confirmed compliance with absentee ballot mailing deadlines for each primary and general election for federal office. ELECT staff developed and administered the required surveys for each federal election following the December 14, 2010 consent decree until it expired without objection from the U.S. Department of Justice in 2012.
Following the expiration of the consent decree, ELECT staff worked to accommodate the localities’ request to simplify and streamline the reporting requirements as much as possible while preserving the capacity to monitor compliance with the federal and state statutory mandates. Accordingly, the current survey general registrars use to certify compliance with these requirements is much simpler and used to certify compliance in nonfederal elections.
*Data may change over time as refinements are made to the data queries used to create this visual.
