June 1, 2021-7:56 p.m.
Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration told counties Tuesday that mail ballots must be signed and dated to count, stepping into a legal and political fight that led top Republican lawmakers to threaten Philadelphia elections officials with impeachment last week.
That effectively sided Wolf, a Democrat, with Republicans in an escalating confrontation that could further inflame partisan rancor in Harrisburg as Republicans seek changes to state election law and prepare to negotiate a new congressional district map with Wolf. And it raised the stakes as city elections officials were set to meet Tuesday afternoon to officially announce the results/ vote count from the May 18 primary.
“As you know, the department updated the content and the instructions on the declaration envelope to ensure that voters know they must sign and date the envelope for their ballot to be counted,” Marks wrote, with the words “sign and date” in bold. “Furthermore, our updated guidance is consistent with the [state] Supreme Court’s ruling last September… wherein the Court held that in future elections a voter’s declaration envelope must be both signed and dated for the ballot to count.”
Philadelphia elections officials last week voted 2-1 to count undated mail ballots, with the two Democratic city commissioners saying their votes to accept the ballots were a matter of not disenfranchising voters.
“Though we share your desire to prevent the disenfranchisement of any voter, particularly when it occurs because of a voter’s inadvertent error, we must strongly urge all counties to abide by the Court’s interpretation of this statutory requirement,” Marks wrote in the email.
The department oversees elections, but elections are run by counties. The state issues guidance, but the ultimate decision of ballot counting is left to independent boards of elections in each of the 67 counties. The counties announce their official vote counts this week before certifying them and sending them to the Department of State by next Monday.
Philly will count undated mail ballots the Pa. Supreme Court said should be thrown outIn a split decision last fall, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that mail ballots must be signed and dated to count. But that decision also allowed undated ballots to be counted in the 2020 election. And a local Democratic election lawyer has said there may be some wiggle room in the court’s decision, since the deciding vote, from Justice David Wecht, came with an expectation that voters would have more warning of the need to date their ballots before the next election.
Last year was the first in which any Pennsylvania voter could cast a mail ballot.
After the two Democratic Philadelphia city commissioners, Lisa Deeley and Omar Sabir, voted to accept undated mail ballots last week, top Republican lawmakers in the state House sent them letters telling them to reverse course or face impeachment.
“So there can be no misunderstanding — failure to promptly conform to Pennsylvania law will leave us no choice but to seek your removal from office using the authority vested to the House of Representatives,” the legislative leaders wrote.
There were 1,319 undated Philadelphia mail ballots for the May 18 primary, about 2% of the 64,000 ballots received by the deadline that night. Counting them wasn’t expected to change the outcome of any races.
Officials in some other counties, including suburban Bucks, Chester, Delaware, and Montgomery Counties, said they were also counting undated mail ballots. A person familiar with Republican deliberations said their focus was on Philadelphia for now, and “hopefully that sends a message to the rest of the counties.”
Pa. Republican lawmakers threaten to impeach Philly officials for counting undated mail ballotsBut Deeley and Sabir said they wouldn’t reconsider their position, with Deeley saying Friday “it is unbecoming of the House Republican leaders to try and extort another elected official to change their vote.”
Nick Custodio, a deputy commissioner under Deeley, defended the move Tuesday, saying Deeley knew of the court ruling when she voted but believes it ”is not as strong as other people think, as indicated by how many counties have counted these ballots.”
On Saturday, undeterred by the impeachment threat, officials opened and counted the undated mail ballots.
The third commissioner, Republican Al Schmidt, had voted to reject undated mail ballots, saying the law and court ruling were clear.
“The law, the court, and the state have been clear that undated ballots cannot be counted,” he said Tuesday . “It’s helpful that [the Department of State] has reiterated this for the counties prior to today’s computation of the election results.”
