comment: >
  
  I had my ballot cancled by a poll worker on election day because it never came in. After it was canceled I voted normally.
context: No. Shit. Hilariously even after that the fucking scumfuck conservatives still lost the state house. >
  
  Less hilariously, none of the scumfuck conservatives involved in this went to jail or have been given any real reason not to try the same tricks in the next election
  "Scumfuck" is a real nice expletive, btw, good ~~vowel consonance~~ assonance >
  
  Well now that the Democrats have control, they should pass some laws to make it way harder to invalidate ballots - hell, they should add vote by mail for the whole state >
  
  Unfortunately, Republicans still control the state Senate PA and are free to obstruct anything the state House passes.
  PA Dems need a landslide in 2024. >
  
  Well I'm moving up there very soon so I'll be adding my vote for blue. I'm helping. >
  
  thank you 
  also please repeal the asinine filial responsibility laws >
  
  What a despicable law! A child is responsible for the parent’s nursing home bills as long as the parent didn’t abandon the child for a period of at least 10 years while the child was under the age of 18?! Not saying this is your situation, but why should you be on the hook for the nursing home bills of your parent, who abused the hell out of your from birth to whenever you were able to escape the home and have never had contact with them again? Even a in loving parent/child relationship it’s patently unrealistic! >
  
  Why should they be on the hook for the nursing home bill at all? >
  
  
  Why should they be on the hook for the nursing home bill at all?
  
  Exactly! 
  The wealthy get away with everything because the money "isn't really theirs, they are just a caretaker of the trust that happens to give our free private plane rides to its caretakers" or some nonsense like that. 
  Meanwhile, we get generational poverty. >
  
  Maybe your great-great-grandparents should have thought about that before being born poor. >
  
  Republicans cheat yet still lose.  Pitiful. >
  
  And that is why they say the election(s) were stolen.
  They tried their hardest to cheat and still lost. Ergo, it was stolen. >
  
  
  "The elections are dirty"
  
  Said the child with mud on his hands. >
  
  The elusive double quote >
  
  The only reason the Republicans oppose mail-in voting is that it makes Democrats stronger.  But they can't come out and say that, so they hide behind claims of fraud. >
  
  It was the state Republican party that passed no excuse mail voting in other states too, like Arizona.
  Worked well enough for them in AZ for thirty years, but all it took for them to change their mind and hate it was the crazies taking over party leadership, and one election in which they didn't do well on mail votes. >
  
  Mail-in ballots used to favor Republican voters who tend to be older and live in more rural areas. The only thing that changed was the pandemic happened and Dem voters largely took it seriously and didn't want to vote in person anymore and Republican voters didn't give a fuck. >
  
  That, and Trump turning his followers against mail voting was a big part of it.
  Once Trump had supporters convinced mail voting was no good, and as a result Republicans in Arizona didn't use it as much in 2020, the crazies that had climbed into state party leadership went (more) nuts and decided to try to get rid of it.
  That hasn't worked. So far. >
  
  Simple mail in voting for every state and election. Number one reason why this would be a good idea is how much Republicans are fighting it and making it so difficult with stupid laws and rules. Then we try for RCV for the same reason as previously mentioned.
  
  The best way to vote is with a beer and a laptop. I don't know much about safe water drainage, but the internet does. - TheWoodSloth >
  
  Before Trump, Republicans were historically some of the highest promoters, defenders, and users of mail-in voting.  Just goes to show how they will abandon facts, evidence, data, and reason in a heartbeat if it allows them to continue the grift.  The GOP realized after Obama was elected that they no longer had a popular mandate with modern voters.  GOP consultants told them to change their platform and embrace progressive political positions to woo new voters.  They absolutely refused to listen to their consultants, so they turned to baseless fear-mongering and dangerous, violent conspiracy theories instead.  There’s even evidence showing that the only major political strategy the GOP has at this point is to attack their opponents.  That’s it.  They aren’t a legitimate political party at this point.  They are just embarrassed confederates trying to turn the clock of history back in time.  They are not good people. >
  
  Yup. Republicans are on their way out. They are in burn it all down mode.
  
  "If conservatives become convinced that they cannot win democratically, they will not abandon conservatism. They will reject democracy." - David Frum >
  
  Isn't this kind of dangerous in a country that has access to nukes? If a country believes in the religious end of days scenario as America does, what is to stop it from kicking it all off with a nuclear war when the opportunity presents itself? >
  
  Cause the people in power just use that to their advantage. People in power pretend to be religious because they aren’t stupid enough to believe it… or at least I hope that’s the case >
  
  Hopefully you are correct, but it all feels a little bit like the "72 virgins" mentality that cause Muslim extremists to want to end the world. >
  
  And the people who believe that were the foot soldiers not the leaders… you think any of the actual leaders would blow themselves up? 😂 smart people tell dumb people what they wanna hear to get what they want >
  
  America is unique in that it has access to thousands of nuclear warheads, but also hundreds of millions of dumb people that can be activated to carry out the crazy by such leaders. This is all a bit unsettling. >
  
  America loves living on the brink of nuclear war, it’s just who we are… thank god Russians decided not to respond to our tricks >
  
  Is relying on the other side to figure out you're not serious a good way to do business? That all seems a bit scary, no? >
  
  John Fetterman still won. But FU for canceling ballots!!! >
  
  He didn't even just win, he whipped complete and total ass. >
  
  At the time, I was expecting 3 Morb-billion votes for John Fetterman. Despite that, he won by a big majority. >
  
  
  Democrats had 10,920 votes thrown out, about half for lacking secrecy envelopes. Republicans saw 3,503 ballots forfeited. Independents and third parties amounted to 1,731 votes that did not count in the fall election.
  
  That seems like a significant number. Especially when elections were so close this past year. Some places (not PA specifically) saw wins by just a few votes. >
  
  The GOP targets certain zipcodes with signature matching.  They have stats how many votes they need to toss out and they do their damndest to hit those targets.  That’s why they were acting as if the results are fungible. >
  
  Signature matching feels like such a shitty verofocation method.
  I can't even remeber the last rime I signed my name to anything. >
  
  Even when I do sign something, I doubt it's frequently consistent >
  
  It’s not, and it’s been challenged as a literacy test for that exact reason. >
  
  How does it feel to cheat and still lose GOP? >
  
  "Like we need to cheat harder next time..." >
  
  Are those ballots mailed to the County Clerk?   Are the GOP now saying that the USPS will lie about their automate postage stamp date?   
  Here in Texas, the USPS office will hand stamp those ballots if that is requested by the voter. >
  
  There's a spot on the outside "secrecy" envelope where you need to hand write the date.  Not the ballot itself, the envelope.  If you don't do that, or it's illegible or incorrect, they throw out the actual ballot.  It's the new literacy test. >
  
  The "literacy" test was not passable, it was a judgment call and the proctor failed minorities and helped whites pass. Poor comparison, this is an actual test of following the voting directions as written >
  
  
  following the voting directions as written
  
  hmm what might one call that >
  
  One of my friend’s brothers received their mail in ballot from a predominant Republican district the month after the election and it was dated 11/7/2022. PA Republicans are CORRUPT. >
  
  Republicans: if you can't win, cheat. >
  
  Then still lose. Brilliant >
  
  Mission accomplished, you Republican’t shitheads! Voter suppression successfully achieved. >
  
  Successfully? They still went the fuck down in flames. >
  
  Exactly why I came home from college to vote. Didn’t want to risk having my mail-in discounted >
  
  Can you imagine how many Dem ballots were disallowed in states like Texas and Florida? >
  
  Mine was in Florida. The excuse was they couldn't verify my signature. >
  
  can we please just stop this nonsense of voter fraud?   there was literally only a few instances and they are all maga people >
  
  I would assume the majority would be dems because the majority of people who mail in vote are dems >
  
  Yeah I feel like this is lost on people. But, the article doesn’t say what the ratio is for mail in voting overall. >
  
  I looked it up. Number I got was "roughly 70%" (of mail in ballot requests to be clear). Number of rejected dem ballots was 68% of total rejected mail in ballots. 
  So in other words, nothing to see here. >
  
  Yup, I could tell that the moment they said half of the dem ballots were thrown out for not using the secrecy envelope, but didn't tell us if half the Republican ballots were thrown out for the same reason.  A difference in ratios would fuckery going on.  No difference in ratios means no fuckery.  But they didnt tell us that to hide their nothingburger story. >
  
  It must be a punch to the gut to cheat and STILL lose >
  
  After my first absentee ballot didn't arrive, my second one never came. JFC. At least we won the big races, but I was so pissed. >
  
  Voter disenfranchisement - the Republican way >
  
  Because fascism. >
  
  Republicans cheated and disenfranchised as many voters as they could—and still lost.  
  Can you imagine if everyone got to vote and the voting had been fair in Pennsylvania? >
  
  And Mastriano and Oz still lost. >
  
  Yeah, no surprise here at all. At least Fetterman and Shaprio won but they tried to throw out as many mail-in-ballots as they could because they realized that would give more people a chance to vote. >
  
  So many Republicans are seriously evil >
  
  So people voted but it didn't have the privacy envelope so it doesn't count? That's like refusing a student their test because they didn't have the correct #2 pencil. Wtf is wrong with people >
  
  I agree with you, but that’s what happened at my university. If you didn’t have the right materials, you were shit out of luck. >
  
  Every accusation is a confession. >
  
  I’m shocked!
  Shocked!
  Okay, not that shocked >
  
  Of course they were.. who’s surprised >
  
  Welcome to america, where counting all the votes is a radical idea.
  Maybe it should be illegal to not count or "cancel" votes and ballots. Just an idea. >
  
  So, what does the class action lawsuit happen?  /s >
  
  Republicans: "Will you PLEASE stop bringing up and pointing out the fact that we are everything we claim to be against?!" >
  
  So… any consequences for this criminally anti-democratic nonsense? >
  
  I can feel the MAGA heresy dripping as they scream about how dare their votes be rejected when democrats were tossed 70% more. Wtf? >
  
  It's all projection. Every accusation is a confession. >
  
  Quelle surprise. >
  
  Yeah no shit >
  
  Gaslight
  Obstruct <------a smattering of this
  Project <------as per usual, a metric shit ton of this. >
  
  Glad the Betterman still won.
  ​
  Fuck Crudité >
  
  Demos had 10,920 votes thrown out, about half for lacking secrecy envelopes. Republicans saw 3,503 ballots forfeited
  So that's a swing of over 7,000 votes. Good thing Fetterman kicked that charlatan's ass or this could have made the difference. >
  
  So much ratfucking, and still losers. >
  
  Shapiros solution: pick a republican to run PA elections >
  
  Al Schmidt is a great choice. No issue here >
  
  Despite this, the Dems won. The Republicans still running on years of failed strategies. >
  
  The real story here is that none of the people who committed this blatant criminal act... are going to face any consequences and will most certainly try again and eventually they will succeed.
  The wheels of Justice are not turning slowly, they're not turning at all. >
  
  Can you explain what crime was committed? The share of mail in voters who were Democrats is in line with the share of rejected mail in voters who were Democrats. So in other words the rejecting did not actually favor one party vs the other. >
  
  Quelle surprise. >
  
  Feature not a bug. >
  
  So what are the deterrents against such shenanigans for the future? >
  
  I’m shocked! Shocked I say! >
  
  Trump shitt >
  
  surprising no one >
  
  How tf do you just cancel a ballot >
  
  By nitpicking at details that don't actually matter, but are used as an excuse to invalidate ballots.
  You can't say "let's void a bunch of votes for Democrats," but you can, knowing that mail-in voters lean Democrat, say "let's void every mail-in ballot with even the tiniest formatting error." And the result is that you intentionally disenfranchise a lot of people who voted for a particular party. >
  
  So ridiculous I will never trust mail in, I’m to paranoid some fascist will see me voting for third party candidates and democrats and be like “yeah nah” shredding noises >
  
  Over 10,000 were Dem votes
  Over 3,000 Republican
  Over 1,000 Independent >
  
  Of course. How else are republicans supposed to win? On policy positions? lmao >
  
  Conservatives literally cheating elections >
  
  Happened to me in Utah (didn’t have time to go down and re-sign the ballot or whatever, I work in healthcare and had like back to back 16 hour days). It was rejected due to “signature mismatch.” I have used essentially the same signature since I got my drivers license, I don’t buy for a second it was far off enough to warrant that. But whatever my district is gerrymandered as hell. >
  
  
  Democrats had 10,920 votes thrown out, about half for lacking secrecy envelopes. Republicans saw 3,503 ballots forfeited. Independents and third parties amounted to 1,731 votes that did not count in the fall election.
  
  It's not just a majority (which would be fair, since Dems cast more votes overall). Dem ballots were thrown out three times as often as Republican ballots.
  Supposedly it's because the ballots fail to meet requirements like putting the vote in a secrecy envelope and having a legible date written on the envelope. But it seems likely that counters can use their discretion to throw out a ballot due to prejudice and claim it's for some other reason. >
  
  Wait… so Biden could have won by even more votes? Tremendous. Simply tremendous. >
  
  “We can’t guarantee your right to privacy in how you voted but we CAN guarantee you don’t get your right to vote at all. You’re welcome.” >
  
  TBF the majority of the mail in ballots were from Dems, period. >
  
  The counties that did not work to cure improper ballots are a fucking disgrace to America >
  
  As much as I dislike the nitpicky formatting laws surrounding mail in ballots in PA, it's the lack of funding for proper notification and clerical review of mail in ballots that I think is at the top of my shit list.  No matter what the mail in voting laws are, you need proper funding for the staff who will review and count the ballots.  And not every county has enough. >
  
  that would make perfect sense since democrats make up the majority of mail in voters >
  
  Anyone else request a mail in ballot, have it confirm that you’ll receive one, and then not receive one? >
  
  Contact you elections office if it happens again >
  
  And Dumb Asstriano still got blown out >
  
  Thank god >
  
  Ya don’t say, got damn seriously. >
  
  Then we need to work on education and have clear instructions for elderly and everyone to fill out ballots correctly and completely. Nullify Republican's strategy. >
  
  Of course they were…. >
  
  Jeepers, who could ever have guessed except everyone because this has always so clearly been the goal? >
  
  Pennsylvania election law is interesting. It doesn't require verification for the signature on a ballot envelope, which is a lower threshold that must be met for early ballots than in some states.
  But it does require the ballot envelope be used to return the ballot, and be signed and dated, as it functions as the legal declaration of the voter's identification.
  Some Pennsylvania counties attempt to contact voters to correct errors on the ballot that would disqualify it. Other counties apparently do not.
  But if a voter didn't provide an email address when applying for a mail ballot, according to the link in the OP, there is no automatic notification system for the voter to get status updates, which is weird.
  Would be good to see the exterior envelope date requirement ended, as negotiations between the Gov and state legislature could have done.
  Seems like a better standardized process for curing ballots would be a good idea too, like the ACLU counsel for Pennsylvania said. Attempt contact via postal mail, email, and by enabling voters to sign up for text notifications on status updates, like some states do. >
  
  Republicans will be very upset at this voting crime. I'm sure of it. >
  
  
  immaterial errors or omissions should not be used to prevent voting
  
  The  Civil Rights Act of 1964 is pretty damn clear on this issue. Someone tell me again how the  US legal system is not a farce. 
  Geriatrics in robes arbitrarily decide whatever they want based on when they had their coffee that morning regardless of all laws, legal precedent, and objective fact. >
  
  Well yea...it threatens the GOP terror network. >
  
  Nice Friday night burial attempt >
  
  How do mail in votes work in the US?
  In sweden mail in is basically just having the possibility to vote earlier then election day. You go to a place, do your thing, they check your vote-card (which everyone gets in the mail at least a month prior to the election) and your ID/passport vs the list of eligible voters and vote-card. Then they put your unidentifiable vote-letters in the three different boxes and all is done. If you mix them with regular election day votes there is zero possible chance to distinguish them.
  It does require some form of reasonable infrastructure though and a national register of citizens. >
  
  I’m Australian and it’s not that I struggle to follow the US electoral system, it’s more I’m astounded that it’s evolved the way it has. 
  You can’t get a simple explanation to mail in voting because each state has its own laws/rules on who, how and when people can vote and it’s borderline madness. 
  At the very least I will never understand how individual states can make such conflicting voting laws in federal elections. Any election for the federal House, Senate and Presidential races should have uniform voting guidelines. 
  Like any sane country would.
  You want to fuck around on a state level and play cute with how people vote, then have at it.
  Federally, everyone should be able to vote early at the polls or mail-in with the same time frames and methods. Be counted in the same way and have the same laws in place around automatic recounts. Also, no district voting to avoid gerrymandering. The entire state gets counted, the candidate with the most votes get the Electoral College votes.
  Anyway, that’s my drunken rant about a topic that offers endless reward for rabbit hole diving trying to make sense of anything. >
  
  I am convinced Republicans cheat the fuck out of the voter system, and have now kinda made me a supporter of a voter ID law? 
  Something tells me that if there was a voter ID law, the GOP numbers would be cut in half. >
  
  GQP are just liars and losers >
  
  And GQP claim no thousands of GQP ballots were canceled lol >
  
  Idk why you guys don’t think this is a biggie? Yeah the dems won house but this amount of dem votes could have easily flipped a few senate seats. To me, this is real election theft. >
  
  They were canceled for legitimate reasons. They weren't filled out or mailed correctly. >
  
  Most if the requirements for mail in ballots are just a measure to confuse people and rejects ballots. Why should someone’s vote not count because they put the wrong date, a day before, the correct one? Especially when each ballot is unique to that election. >
  
  Why would they set out to deliberately "confuse people and reject ballots?" Who is even doing this? If this was deliberate, why is there a system to contact the voter and try to rectify the issue before election day? Both Republicans and Democrats are playing by the same rules and the ballots have multiple positions and measures being voted on. >
  
  Republicans pushed for the stronger restrictions on voter rights and democrats call people back with rejected ballots in an attempt to make sure those people still get to exercise their right. Idk how it’s hard to follow, I’m pretty sure it’s well known at this point. That’s literally why dems started calling people back, PA is one of the first states that started doing it. >
  
  Listen, I 100% agree and acknowledge that the GOP has been passing voter supression laws. But per this article, the ballots were rejected for 2 reasons:
  A) They didn't send it in the envelope that comes with the ballot
  B) They didn't sign the outside of the envelope 
  These are not "confusing" and AFAIK, using that envelope and signing the outside of it has always been a requirement. These are not weird new laws passed by the gop. I'd wager this many mail-in ballots being canceled is a norm for every election, and it's not even a statistical anomaly. >
  
  Puts Doctor Oz on the ballot….blames something else for the loss lol. >
  
  Even when they cheat they still can't win. >
  
  Does anyone know of a proven cheating scenario that involved democrats? Or is it always republicans? >
  
  It’s the voter’s fault in this case for doing things like not using secrecy ballots.
  I HAD THE JOB OF SENDING OUT MAIL IN BALLOTS. There are very specific criteria we need to have to ensure privacy and security. We ship very explicit instructions with each ballot.
  This doesn’t sound like some big conspiracy, instead it sounds like voters didn’t do their due diligence.