Mail ballot fight persists in key states, sure to slow count

PITTSBURGH, UNITED STATES - 2020/11/02: An official election ballot of Pennsylvania of 2020 featuring Biden / Harris, Trump / Pence and Jorgensen / Cohen ahead of the presidential elections.2020 elections are close and will involve voting via absente HARRISBURG, Pa. - Former President Donald Trump and his allies seized on the drawn-out vote processing and counting in Pennsylvania during the 2020 election to fuel his false claims that fraud cost him victory in the battleground state — and election officials worry that a replay could be on the horizon in November's crucial Senate and governor's races.And it's not just Pennsylvania.

Michigan and Wisconsin are other crucial swing states that allow no-excuse mail-in ballots but give local election offices no time before Election Day to process them.Election workers' inability to do that work ahead of time means many of the mailed ballots may not get counted on Election Day, delaying results in tight races and leaving a gaping hole for misinformation and lies to flood the public space."That time between the polls closing on election night and the last vote being counted is really being exploited by people who want to undermine confidence in the process," said Al Schmidt, a Philadelphia election commissioner during the 2020 presidential election who is now president and CEO of the good-government group Committee of Seventy.The first step in processing mailed ballots, or pre-canvassing, is a routine but crucial administrative task that allows election workers to verify voters’ signatures and addresses, or spot problems that could be fixed by voters.