Originally Posted by jacksonbrown (Post 1772812)

"Let's be clear, mail-in voting is not the problem. There is nothing wrong with the concept. Never has been and never will be. "

Rubbish!

Voting is THE foundation of our republic.

See here

Is it too much to ask that a voter MUST produce a picture ID, in person, to vote? In my mind NO!

Originally Posted by jacksonbrown (Post 1772812)

"Let's be clear, mail-in voting is not the problem. There is nothing wrong with the concept. Never has been and never will be. "

Rubbish!

Voting is THE foundation of our republic.

See here

Is it too much to ask that a voter MUST produce a picture ID, in person, to vote? In my mind NO!

Originally Posted by Stuart Zaikov (Post 1772936)

Do not understand why people are not required to show proof of citizenship to vote.

Originally Posted by mtdjed (Post 1772993)

The comment about not being able to access polls is for the most part a Red Herring . That is purely a local issue to be addressed by local governments. Since the beginning of this country , citizens have had to make an effort to vote. Name calling of citizens concerned about integrity of the system is not justified.

Originally Posted by OrangeBlossomBaby (Post 1773069)

The entire brouhaha started when dozens of polling places in minority areas were shut down by state governments, and then minorities trying to get rides to areas away from their homes were not allowed into the other polling places. Some disabled people were instructed to NOT get on the bus that would take them to a distant polling area.

In some states, there were only 2-3 polling areas in an entire county to serve hundreds of thousands of people, because the GOVERNMENT shut down the other polling places ON Election Day.

Meanwhile, in states where absentee voting was allowed, voting took place anyway. And NO confirmed mail fraud AT ALL in those areas.

The red herring is the notion that mail fraud is even a thing with absentee voting. It isn't.

Originally Posted by Stuart Zaikov (Post 1772936)

Do not understand why people are not required to show proof of citizenship to vote.

Originally Posted by retiredguy123 (Post 1773084)

Because there are a lot of people who want non-citizens to vote.

Originally Posted by John41 (Post 1773162)

exactly!!!

Originally Posted by Buckeyephan (Post 1773180)

No surprise that responses seem to be split along party lines. Personally, I don’t have a problem with absentee ballots. Those are requested and the envelope is signed and the signature must match the one the Board of Elections has on file.That is vastly different than mailing out ballots to all registered voters. Some of those may have died, moved or chosen not to vote. Those “extras” can be submitted by anyone who has access to them. Would those signatures be vetted? Harvesting ballots by operatives of either party presents opportunities to interfere during such a contentious election. If our country does transition to mail in ballots, the process needs to be carefully developed and implemented. I don’t feel we have enough time to create a fair and honest system in the time we have left until November. We should get started now for 2024.

As for proof of citizenship, I had to present my birth certificate when I registered in 1968. Until things changed in recent years, my husband and I managed to to vote on Election Day during regular voting hours. That included years when we worked full time and/or had small children. I do find it rather interesting that some people find a way to wait for hours to buy the latest Black Friday deal, video game, cell phone or sneakers. We seem to think nothing of waiting for hours to get on the latest ride at theme parks but are appalled by the thought of waiting in line to vote. Voting should be at least as important as those things.

Unfortunately, we need to prepare ourselves for the losing candidate and party to find an excuse other than the shortcomings of the candidate to explain away the loss. We will have a victim who will bombard us endlessly with whining about being cheated. These are very sad days for our country.

Originally Posted by GoPacers (Post 1772730)

Let's be clear, mail-in voting is not the problem. There is nothing wrong with the concept. Never has been and never will be. The issue is verifying/validating that any given voter is authorized to vote and is who they say they are. If Congress (and the states) would take that issue seriously then we would not be talking about mail-in voting at all.

Talking about voter fraud: what system have we ever had that hasn't been decried for the potential for voter fraud? I'll admit there are elections that have been impacted due to voter fraud over the years but those are very few. In many, but not all, of those cases the votes were coerced yet legally cast.

In this whole debate we've lost sight of the facts which seems to be all too prevalent lately. When we don't have facts to support our position we make stuff up that can't be easily proven/disproven. When we have data but that data doesn't support our position we obfuscate the issue such that data becomes irrelevant and we appeal to emotions to supersede logic.

Those that have the legal right to vote should be allowed to vote by any means available. We should not be making it hard for anyone to vote as a means to influence elections. What we should be focusing on is using the vast array of technology available to us to ensure those who vote are entitled to vote and that their vote is in fact theirs. The reason we are not doing this is it removes an excuse for the losing side to obfuscate the facts and create uncertainty. This has not changed since the earliest days of elections in this great country. Bad actors have been trying to influence the will of the people through nefarious means since day one.

The simple fact that we are debating mail-in voting says the politicians have succeeded in planting seeds of doubt in the process without ever producing one single piece of data to prove that mail-in voting is the issue.