ATLANTA — Two ballot boxes in the Pacific Northwest were damaged in an alleged arson attack just a week before Election Day, destroying hundreds of ballots at one location in Vancouver, Washington.
On the other hand, in neighboring Portland, Oregon, it appears that the firefighting system worked to contain the fire and limit the number of damaged ballots to three. Authorities are reviewing surveillance footage as they try to identify who is responsible.
Here’s how the rules and security measures around drop boxes vary across the country, and how election conspiracy theories have undermined confidence in their use.
Police say incendiary devices started fires in drop boxes in Portland and Vancouver. Authorities said evidence showed the fires were connected and that they were also related to an incident on October 8 when an incendiary device was placed in a different drop box in Vancouver.
Multnomah County Elections Director Tim Scott said his office plans to contact three voters whose ballots were damaged in Portland to help them get replacements.
In Vancouver, hundreds of ballots were lost in ballot boxes at Fisher’s Landing Transit Center when the drop box fire suppression system did not work as expected. Clark County Auditor Greg Kimsey said the last box was empty at 11 a.m. Friday. Voters who dropped their ballots there are encouraged to contact the office to request a new one.
The office will increase how often it collects ballots and change the collection time to the evening so that ballot boxes are not full overnight when vandalism is more common.
Kimsey described the suspected arson as “a direct attack on democracy.”
Drop-in ballots have been used for years in states such as Colorado, Oregon, Utah and Washington, where ballots are mailed to all registered voters.
They have increased in popularity in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, as election officials look for options for voters who want to avoid crowded polling places or worry about mail delays.
In all, 27 states and the District of Columbia allow drop boxes, according to data compiled by the National Conference of State Legislatures. The other six have no specific laws but allow local communities to use them.
Placement may vary. In some communities, the space is inside a public building, available only during office hours. Elsewhere, they are outside and accessible at any hour, usually with video surveillance or bystanders.
Sporadic problems have occurred over the years.
In 2020, several drop boxes were hit by vehicles, and one in Massachusetts was destroyed by fire. In these cases, most ballots are legible enough to allow voters to be identified and substitutes sent. Drop boxes were also burned in Los Angeles County in 2020.
The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency advises state and local election officials to place drop boxes in convenient, high-traffic areas known to voters, such as libraries and community centers.
If the drop box is unmanned, it should be secured and locked at all times, located in a well-lit area and monitored by video surveillance cameras, the guide says. Many are released underground, monitored by cameras or confined to public buildings during business hours, where they can be monitored.
Ballot boxes have been in the spotlight for the past four years, targeted by right-wing conspiracy theorists who falsely claim they are responsible for massive voter fraud in 2020.
A film called “2,000 Mules” expanded on these claims, exposing millions of people to the baseless theory that ballot harvesting operations dropped ballots into drop boxes at night.
An Associated Press survey of state election officials in the U.S. found no issues related to drop-off boxes in 2020.
Paranoia about drop boxes continued into the 2022 midterms, when armed vigilantes began monitoring them in Arizona and were restricted by federal judges. This year, the conservative group True the Vote launched a website that provides livestreams of drop boxes in various countries.
In Montana, where a key U.S. Senate race is on the ballot, Republicans recently resorted to unreliable ballot boxes to raise money from doubts about the election process.
Republican lawmakers in several states are seeking to tighten rules on mail-in voting after the 2020 election, and many are focusing on the use of drop-off boxes.
Six states have since banned it: Arkansas, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, South Carolina and South Dakota, according to research by the Voting Rights Lab, which advocates for expanded voting access.
Other countries have restricted its use. That includes Ohio and Iowa, which currently only allow one drop box per county, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.
In Georgia’s Fulton County, which includes Atlanta and has over 1 million residents, 10 ballot boxes are available for this year’s presidential election. That’s down from 38 four years ago under emergency rules prompted by the pandemic. This is the result of an election overhaul by the Republic of Georgia in response to former President Donald Trump’s false claims of a stolen election.
Overall, 12 states either ban drop boxes or do not list drop boxes as an approved method of producing ballots, according to data compiled by the National Conference of State Legislatures. The other five states have no state law and do not use drop-down boxes.
Drop boxes have been used for years in Wisconsin, one of the presidential battlegrounds this year, but support for them has been divided along ideological lines since 2020. In Wausau, a conservative mayor threw out the city’s only drop box, an act that is being investigated by the government . State Department of Justice. The drop box is back and in use.
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Swenson reported from New York.
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