On June 4, the MA House advanced a bill to expand opportunities to vote by mail and vote early in light of COVID-19 (Read about the good and the bad of the bill here.)
Now, it’s the Senate’s time to vote, and that means another opportunity to improve the bill–to make it better for voting access and better for public health.
That’s why we’re supporting the following amendments:
#1 (Rausch): Automatic Ballot Delivery for the General Election, which would automatically mail general election early voting ballots to every active registered voter in the Commonwealth
#3 (Lesser): Strengthening mail ballot request online portal, which strengthens the bill’s language establishing an online portal for absentee ballot requests
#6 (Chandler): Creating a Timely Online Ballot Request Portal, which would ensure that the early voting portal is available for the primary election as well as the general, as is included in the House version
#7 (Chang-Diaz): Voting Accessibility, which requires the necessary accommodations for individuals with disabilities to be able to vote by mail
#8 (Hinds): Ballots Mailed by Election Day, which ensures that ballots mailed by Election Day will be counted
#15 (Eldridge): Same Day Registration, which establishes same-day voter registration for all 2020 elections.
#20 (Eldridge): Safeguarding equity and access when making changes to polling places, which requires cities and towns to make specific findings when changing polling places, including that doing so would not have a disparate adverse impact on access to the polls on the basis of race, national origin, disability, income, or age, and increases the notice period for changed polling location from 15 to 20 days.
#23 (Rausch): Voter education and outreach, which requires Secretary Galvin to conduct a public awareness campaign promoting the new and expanded early voting and mail voting procedures included in the bill.
#24 (Eldridge): Guaranteeing Safe, Accessible, and Fair Elections For All, which strengthens the protections of and guidance around safe in-person voting
#35 (Cyr): Language Access, which requires transliteration of all candidates’ names as part of the bilingual ballot (for all translated ballots in languages not using Roman alphabet) and requires all candidates to be provided with written copy of transliteration
