VA Early Vote Wk 4: Tallies, Spikes & IDs
Provisional ballots show sudden spike after regular registration ended this week. Plus, overall turnout types show first-time voters surging.
In this issue of EPEC Team:
—Tallies & Turnout Trends
—Sudden Jump in Provisional Ballots
—UOCAVA & Overseas Way Up over 2020
—Confusion over Driver Privilege Cards as Voter ID
1. Tallies & Turnout in 2024 Election:
At the fourth week of Virginia’s 45-day voting period in the 2024 Presidential Election, the Commonwealth is heading past the million mark on ballots that are in a “countable” state, or about 17% of the active-voter registrants of 5.8 million.
Here’s the breakdown as of 10/18:
Countable = 993,738 — which consists of:
725,315 = on machine (in person)
267,565 = mail-in ballots
Analysis to note:
L2 Data has been modeling for the political leanings of voters in Virginia and sees that about 52% of ballots cast so far have been by Democrat or D-leaning voters.
Non-affiliated voters are averaging about 6% of the tally thus far, and Republican and R-leaning voters are showing up in estimates at 42% of the tally.
(These are estimates as Virginia does not specify political party when registering citizens to vote.)
In past years, Republican voters have been reluctant to turn out for early voting, averaging about 25% to 30% of the early voting participation. Not this year.
One development to note: Real Clear Polling has moved Virginia’s Congressional District 10 into “toss-up” category. The seat, held by the retiring Democrat Rep. Jennifer Wexton (battling a rare form of Parkinson’s Disease), was considered “Lean-D” by RCP.
Turnout is way up in rural counties. But as we show farther down in this report, many populous Northern Virginia localities have a high number of ballots still out.
Spikes We See:
EPEC Team’s volunteer CTO Jon Lareau has been breaking out the “countable” tally by three voter types:
High Propensity = Voted in 75% or more of the November General Elections on file. Medium Propensity = Voted in less than 75% of November General Elections on file. Low Propensity = Voter has never voted in November General Elections on record.
The Countable Breakdown:
High propensity voters cast 700,801 of all ballots so far, up by 40% from last week.
Medium propensity voters were 225,494, also up by 40% in a week.
Low propensity voters cast 59,667 of the countable tally — up by 50% in one week and a 12% jump from the prior day of voting. That’s a spike in low propensity voters.
2. Spikes in Provisional Ballots
EPEC Team has also observed a spike in provisional ballots this week, some 764 as of Saturday. Presumably a bulk of these are considered Same Day Registrations. See the Summary Data DAL Feed on DigitalPollWatchers.org (see red arrow in image):
Rick Naigle, Senior Analyst for EPEC Team, has been tracking the daily numbers, such as 270 provisional ballots on Oct. 17th.
He writes:
Our analysis of early voting data shows a sharp uptick in Provisional ballots starting on 16 October. The chart below shows Provisional voting by day during the early voting period.
During the first several weeks of early voting, Virginians cast an average of 2 to 3 provisional ballots per day. The average jumped to 199 per day starting on 16 October.
The spike observed on 17 October exceeded the largest number of provisional ballots received on a single day during the 2020 General Election early voting period.
We are past the last date to register for the November 5th General Election. Some voters may have waited too long to register, in which case Same Day Registration would have resulted in a provisional ballot being voted.
It also might be due to some voters having been erroneously removed from the Registered Voter List during routine voter list maintenance.
A number of non-citizen voters were recently removed from the Virginia Registered Voter List, and a portion of those individuals had voted in prior elections.
[See Lareau’s analysis showing more than a thousand ballots cast in the past year by noncitizens before they were removed from voter rolls by ELECT.]
Some of those individuals may have taken advantage of Same Day Registration to try to cast a ballot in the 2024 election even though they are not eligible.
The increase in provisional ballots may be a harbinger of what lies ahead for election officials. Additional steps are required to process provisional ballots. Many precincts staff with Same Day Registration (SDR) specialists, who appear to be busier than usual this week. #
3. UOCAVA #s Appear to Have Exceeded all of 2020 in VA
The Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, commonly referred to as UOCAVA, is a federal law that enables overseas active military and other uniformed services to vote absentee (see Federal Voting Assistance Program website).
Many of these voters use the registration (and residency) they established before they went into service or on assignment overseas.
Another category of UOCAVA includes overseas citizens who are not able to return to their state of residence to cast a ballot.
This year, some states are allowing individuals who have never established residency in the U.S. — and don’t have a family connection to military — to cast overseas ballots. It has led to litigation in Michigan and North Carolina over state Constitution requirements that voters must establish residency before casting an overseas ballot.
“The [Republican National Committee] RNC alleges North Carolina’s Uniform Military and Overseas Act is extending voter rights to individuals not covered by the federal act,” reporter Lauren Taylor writes.
The lawsuits assert both states are extending “eligibility to overseas voters who never resided in these states—indeed, may never have resided anywhere in the United States.”
Similar litigation is in play in Pennsylvania over allowing overseas voters to cast a ballot without ever establishing residency, as U.S. citizens and overseas military voters are required to do.
EPEC Team is watching the cases, and the UOCAVA numbers in Virginia, which are way up over the numbers we have for 2020 Early Voting in the category.
In 2020, the number of Overseas Citizen ballots within the UOCAVA category were about 15,000. For the Military portion of UOCAVA, about 13,389 absentee ballots were considered countable.
At the Oct. 19 mark of early voting, UOCAVA ballots in “countable” status are on track to overtake the 2020 numbers. (Mobile readers can “pinch” up.)
The chart below shows another view of 2024 UOCAVA ballots (broken into issued and countable statuses). Mobile readers can “pinch” up.
Many localities in Northern Virginia also show a high percentage of ballots still “issued,” or in the mail system. (See image below.)
4. Confusion Over Types of Voter IDs Issued to Noncitizens
According to VA Dept. of Elections, “Driver Privilege Cards” (DPC) are not acceptable forms of voter ID. If a potential voter shows one to vote in person, in some localities the EO is reportedly instructed to ask the individual for other forms of ID.
The nonprofit law firm Restoring Integrity and Trust in Elections (RITE) sent a letter to Commissioner of Elections Susan Beals this week, alerting her about issues with Prince William County’s election officer training manual that does that.
According to RITE’s letter to Beals, PWC’s training manual allows “individuals presenting a Driver Privilege Card (‘DPC’), which are issued only to non-citizens, to vote without challenge, so long as the person presents another form of identification.”
This instruction to officers of election to allow persons presenting a DPC to vote without challenge is unlawful. An individual’s possession of a DPC is strong evidence that he is a non-citizen and is certainly sufficient for an officer of election to “suspect” as much, since Virginia issues DPCs exclusively to non-citizens.
The letter continues:
Except for a United States passport, other forms of identification, including driver’s licenses, paychecks, bank statements, and utility bills, are not evidence that a person who possesses a DPC has become a citizen.
RITE has requested that Virginia election officials take immediate action to correct this situation in Prince William County by notifying the county of its obligation to challenge voters who present DPCs. It has also requested that she issue guidance to other counties to ensure they do not make a similar error.
A driver license ID is by far the dominant method of presenting voter ID in Virginia’s elections. The revised guidance over types of IDs not accepted can be seen here.
BACKGROUNDER on Driver Privilege Cards:
According to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests by EPEC Team volunteers: Virginia’s Dept. of Motor Vehicles is allowed to issue Driver Privilege Cards (DPC) and permits to applicants who “may not meet” citizenship requirements for licenses (46.2-328.1). See more about the DMV Policy here.
However, some types of DPCs may involve citizens whose driving privileges have been suspended or curtailed. The DMV system appears to lump in noncitizens and citizens in the DPC issuance, which leads to confusion among election workers.
EPEC Team is following the issue throughout early voting and as Election Day approaches.
(Full disclosure: See the letter that RITE issued to ELECT on behalf of EPEC about providing full date-of-birth voter data in compliance with the National Voter Registration Act.) #
That’s a wrap on this week’s Early Voting report.
EPEC Team is publishing with more frequency during the 2024 Presidential Election with analysis and news articles about voting, turnout trends, and process management.
In the meantime we urge our readers to get out and vote!
This is a terrific, detailed report. The report of Prince William County's election office providing false, even unlawful advice is more evidence that one political party really, really wants noncitizens to vote, even though that's illegal.