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40–511 2008

EXPANDING AND IMPROVING OPPORTUNITIES TO 

VOTE BY MAIL OR ABSENTEE 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ELECTIONS 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON HOUSE 

ADMINISTRATION 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

HEARING HELD IN WASHINGTON, DC, OCTOBER 16, 2007 

Printed for the use of the 

Committee on House Administration 

( 

Available on the Internet: 

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/house/administration/index.html 


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COMMITTEE ON HOUSE ADMINISTRATION 

ROBERT A. BRADY, Pennsylvania, Chairman 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

Vice-Chairwoman 

MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts 

CHARLES A. GONZALEZ, Texas 

SUSAN A. DAVIS, California 

ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama 

VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan 

Ranking Minority Member 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

KEVIN MCCARTHY, California 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ELECTIONS

ZOE LOFGREN, California, Chairwoman 

CHARLES A. GONZALEZ, Texas 

SUSAN A. DAVIS, California 

ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama 

KEVIN MCCARTHY, California 

VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan 


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EXPANDING AND IMPROVING OPPORTUNITIES TO VOTE BY MAIL OR ABSENTEE 

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2007 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON ELECTIONS, COMMITTEE ON HOUSE ADMINISTRATION, Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 2:02 p.m., in room 

1310, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Zoe Lofgren (chairwoman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Lofgren, Gonzalez, Davis of California, 

Davis of Alabama, and McCarthy. 

Staff Present: Liz Birnbaum, Staff Director; Matt Pinkus, Professional Staff/Parliamentarian; Thomas Hicks, Senior Election Counsel; Janelle Hu, Election Counsel; Jennifer Daehn, Election Counsel; Kristin McCowan, Chief Legislative Clerk; Daniel Favarulo, 

Staff Assistant/Elections; Matthew DeFreitas, Staff Assistant; Fred 

Hay, Minority General Counsel; Bryan Dorsey, Minority Professional Staff; Gineen Beach, Minority Election Counsel; and Roman 

Buhler, Minority Election Counsel. 

Ms. LOFGREN. As it is 2 o’clock, the subcommittee will come to 

order. 

Good afternoon and welcome to the Subcommittee on Elections, 

our hearing on ‘‘Expanding and Improving Opportunities to Vote by 

Mail or by Absentee.’’ Absentee voting and vote-by-mail are increasingly being used by 

State and local governments; however, the concept is not a new 

one. In 1998, it is worth noting that Oregon passed legislation directing all elections to be conducted by mail; and other States such 

as California, Ohio, Maine, Maryland, South Dakota, Vermont and 

Washington have vote-by-mail or allow for permanent absentee ballots. In fact, under a law signed by then-Governor George Bush, 

Texas even allows residents to cast absentee ballots from space. 

Research on vote-by-mail shows that it results in increased turnout, a less costly election, uniform and strict compliance to State 

law through a centralized process and an automatic paper trail. 

Voters find that vote-by-mail is more convenient and user friendly. 

It also provides them more time to study the ballot. 

However, vote-by-mail and absentee voting is not without criticism. Some are concerned about chain-of-custody issues, possible 

voter fraud, and suppressed voter participation. While I respect 

these criticisms, I believe that studies show otherwise. A centralized location for ballot collection and counting results in increased 

security and compliance with State law. On average, vote-by-mail 


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elections cost 30 percent less than regular polling place elections, 

and I would note that in my own county of Santa Clara, the county 

has bought ads on the buses asking people to please sign up because it will help with their budget issues on elections. 

I believe also that the concern over voter fraud is overblown. Oregon, which has been doing vote-by-mail for the past 9 years, has 

only prosecuted one case of voter fraud since 1998. Vote-by-mail is 

also a significant tool used by States to maintain their voter lists. 

Most States which use no-excuse vote-by-mail result in about a 15 

percent increase in voter participation. 

I think it is also important to note that absentee voting can be 

used by our military to vote in all Federal elections. If absentee 

voting is good enough and secure enough for the men and women 

in the military, does it not make sense to extend that right to all 

eligible voters? 

Absentee voting and vote-by-mail provide a means for qualified 

voters to participate in upcoming elections. Access to the democratic process for all voters, be it at the polls or by mail, should 

be made as easy and secure as possible. 

Our witnesses today will discuss their experiences with absentee 

and vote-by-mail and how the process has changed and developed 

over the years to ensure the integrity and accessibility of the electoral process. 

At this point I would like to recognize the Ranking Member of 

this subcommittee, our colleague from California, Kevin McCarthy, 

for any opening statement that he may wish to offer. 

[The statement of Ms. Lofgren follows:] 


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Mr. MCCARTHY. Thank you for recognizing me, Chairwoman 

Lofgren. 

Expanding opportunities to encourage more Americans to vote is 

a goal that cuts across party lines. To that end, the subcommittee 

will hear about four bills that our colleague from San Diego has introduced, which she will provide testimony to, and we will further 

discuss with a panel of witnesses. 

Before we analyze those bills, I want to point out my great disappointment with the majority’s conduct in preparation for this 

meeting. I believe that Congress should conduct itself with fairness, transparency, and cooperation because in the end, Congress 

needs to push aside politics and instead push forward fair debate 

and the best solutions to address the needs of the American people. 

When I was sworn in this year, I listened very closely to our new 

Speaker. She used the phrase ‘‘partnership, not partisanship.’’ there are few issues in Congress that cry bipartisanship more than 

those within the jurisdiction of this subcommittee. We have the responsibility to find solutions that ensure elections are fair and give 

the American people confidence that their vote will not be diluted, 

miscounted, or manipulated for one party’s gain. 

As you know, I produced the letter to you, Madam Chairwoman, 

asking that we have a level playing field, that we hear from all 

views. In the 109th Congress when the majority was different, 

when I look back upon the hearings, I look at the HAVA hearing 

where there were four Democrats and four Republican witnesses. 

Then I studied the 527 hearings on April 20, 2005. There were four 

Democrats and three Republicans, when the Democrats were in the 

minority party. Then I studied the FEC-Internet hearing in this 

committee on September 22, 2005. There were four Democrats and 

four Republicans. I went to the Milwaukee hearing on 10/24/05. 

There were six Democrats and five Republicans. 

When I requested to have a panel here, that was individuals who 

were able to give testimony—I know it would be 10 minutes 

longer—I was denied because how hearings were held inside the 

Judiciary Committee. This is the House Administration Committee. 

When we had the Election Assistance Commission on June 8 of 06 

we had two Democrats and two Republicans. When we had ID 

hearings when it came to voters on proposing IDs, we had five 

Democrats and five Republicans. 

A hearing on securing the vote of Arizona on 8/3/06, we had four 

Democrats and four Republicans. On the hearing of securing the 

vote in New Mexico, we had three Democrats and three Republicans. On the paper trail hearing on September 28, 2006, we had 

three Democrats and three Republicans. 

Today will be different. Today, we will have one side. We will 

have the testimony of the author and then we will have three witnesses from the majority and one witness from the minority. 

That is a disappointment to me. I want to make sure elections 

are entrusted, that we are given all the information possible, and 

I don’t believe 10 minutes is too long to hear from all sides. There 

are lots of things that I wanted to change when I ran for Congress, 

but one thing I wanted to keep was House Administration being 

fair, honest, and being appropriate. I will submit my statement for 

the record. 


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Ms. LOFGREN. Without objection, your statement is submitted for 

the record, and other opening statements will be submitted for the 

record. 

[The statement of Mr. McCarthy follows:] 


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Ms. LOFGREN. And I will take the prerogative of the Chair just 

to briefly respond to the comments made. The ratio of witnesses in 

committees throughout the Congress is 3 to 1, and that does not 

mean we will never vary from that. But when I received your letter, actually Friday, this hearing had already been set. 

And certainly the majority reserves the right to set the agenda 

in the Congress and we hope to do that in as collaborative a way 

as possible. But I do not want to take further time from the testimony we will receive today. 

So we will go first to our first witness, Congresswoman Susan 

Davis, who was first elected in 2001 to represent California’s 53rd 

Congressional District in the United States House of Representatives. She sits on the House Armed Services Committee, where she 

served as Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Military Personnel. 

She also sits on the House Education and Labor Committee and 

the House Administration Committee. 

Prior to her service in Congress, Representative Davis served on 

the San Diego City School Board as well as three terms in the California State Assembly. Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Susan 

grew up in Richmond, California. She graduated from the University of California at Berkeley with a degree in sociology. She then 

earned a master’s degree in social work from the University of 

North Carolina. And she is not only our colleague from California, 

but our colleague on the committee and really a leader in authoring 

bills that deal with this general subject. So we are thrilled to have 

you testimony here today, Susan. 

STATEMENT OF THE HON. SUSAN A. DAVIS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman 

Lofgren and Ranking Member McCarthy and fellow members of the 

subcommittee. I want to thank you for the opportunity to testify 

about giving all voters the option to vote by mail. 

I vote at the polls because I like to. As a Member of Congress, 

like you, I always have the general Election Day off, and sometimes even cameras show up. But voting in person is not so easy 

for many people. 

As my colleagues from California know, anyone can vote by mail 

in California for any reason. Voting by mail is so popular that 46 

percent of Californians chose to vote that way in 2006. I took the 

right to vote by absentee for granted until 2004, when a nurse from 

Ohio that I met told me that she could not vote for President because the polls there were only open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., hours 

that overlapped with her commute and her shift. She called her 

elections office in advance to request an absentee ballot but was 

told her work was not a valid reason to vote absentee. Since she 

would not abandon her patients, she did not vote. And neither did 

coworkers, nor undoubtedly thousands of citizens in Ohio and 

States with similar laws. Fortunately, Ohio has changed its laws 

to allow no-excuse absentee voting, but 28 States and territories 

still have not. 

I am going to turn to the slides. On this map the States in dark 

blue are either all vote-by-mail or offered no-excuse absentee voting. The lighter blue States require certain reasons or excuses to 


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send an absentee ballot. Since Kansas started no-excuse absentee 

voting in 1967, 28 States have followed suit and no one has 

switched back. 

Notice that this map does not look like the red State, blue State 

map. States with both Democratic and Republican Governors and 

legislatures have switched to no-excuse absentee voting. 

As with poll voting, the advantage in mail voting goes to the better organized campaign, not to the political party. 

The next slide shows that the States that require excuses, these 

reasons vary widely. Many even basic excuses that we think of do 

not count in some States. As you can see, some States do not even 

allow election responsibilities, those who work at the polls, school, 

or jury duty to count as excuses. Sometimes work counts as an acceptable reason for requesting an absentee ballot, but sometimes it 

does not. And in some States any work is an excuse, but others 

have odd limiting laws. 

In Tennessee, you must be working outside the county with a 

commercial driver’s license. In Alabama you must work at least a 

10-hour shift. Every State has allowances for physical absence, but 

there is a range there, too. For example, in Indiana you must be 

out of the county for all 12 hours the polls are open. And in Louisiana you must be outside your parish not only on Election Day 

but for the entire early voting period. 

Illness and disability requirements vary as well. In Missouri you 

must be incapacitated or confined. In Michigan you can vote by 

mail only if you cannot make it to the polls without the assistance 

of another person. Some States allow people over a certain age to 

vote absentee. In Michigan it is over 60, in Mississippi it is 65, and 

in Georgia it is 75. Verification required for excuses also ranges 

and much of it is an invasion of privacy. 

On the next slide, this is the Virginia absentee voting ballot application. By the top circle you can see that it requires the voter 

to state where he or she will be vacationing. In the next area you 

have to indicate the exact hours of your work and give your employer’s name and address. On the next you must list the nature 

of your disability or illness. And in the religion section, you have 

to explain the nature of your religious obligation. 

Does the government need to know this personal information just 

to let an American citizen exercise his or her right to vote? 

In the next slide, you will see in Delaware you need to put your 

location and phone number on Election Day. And here you need a 

notary signature to prove that you are on vacation or have religious 

obligations. The cost and hassle of this requirement equates to a 

modern-day poll tax. 

In Tennessee, on the next slide, there is not even an application 

form. You just have to write a letter. You can see from the requirements on the official Web site that the voters—and I would quote—

the voter’s licensed physician must file the statement with the 

County Election Commission stating that in the physician’s judgment that the voter is medically unable to vote in person, unquote. 

It is not surprising that only 1.7 percent requested absentees are 

in Tennessee. 

These individual State restrictions are totally unnecessary as 

they do nothing to increase security. All they do is suppress the use 


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of absentee ballots, which is around 1 to 10 percent in most excuse 

States as opposed to the 20 to 50 percent in no-excuse States. Voters have repeatedly shown that they want to be able to vote by 

mail. 

Allowing no-excuse absentee voting can increase turnout from 

anywhere between 2 and 10 percent, and sometimes much more. 

That may sound small but it would, in fact, be millions of voters 

nationwide. No voting system can ever be perfect, but absentee voting has proven to have comparatively few instances of foul play, as 

the other panelists will detail. The potential for vote suppression 

is clearly a much greater problem than the potential for fraud. Our 

goal should be to enable people to take part in the process, not to 

put up barriers. 

The reality today is that people pursuing the American dream 

are buying homes far from where they work. They get up early, 

commute long distances, and savor precious family time. Many people work hourly wage jobs and have to balance child care. They 

want to participate in democracy, but cannot or do not want to 

make a trip to the polls. 

With all the referendums on ballots these days it can take 20 or 

30 minutes to vote, even if you are first in line. Is a person any 

less patriotic for wanting to do his civic duty at his kitchen table 

rather than braving bad weather long lines and partisan politicking at the polls? Does he or she have less of a right to vote than 

other Americans? 

No excuse absentee voting does not force anyone to vote by mail. 

What it does is give voters a choice. Some people say the Federal 

Government has no business implementing no-excuse absentee voting. As a former State and local official, I have great respect for 

the role of the States but no-excuse absentee voting is not a violation of States rights. In fact, first, it levels the playing field. Keeping our current system allows voters in some States more opportunities to vote than others, and it creates a kind of inequity when 

voters are voting in the same election. 

Perhaps more important on a constitutional level, State and local 

officials are responsible for administering elections, but they cannot 

decide who can vote. That is the job of the Federal Government. 

In a recent national poll 94 percent said they believe society 

should make it as convenient as possible for eligible citizens to 

vote, and 58 percent said Congress should work to make voting 

easier. 

I ask that the subcommittee members support my Universal 

Right to Vote by Mail bill, H.R. 281. This bill would simply require 

that all voters be given the opportunity to vote by mail for any reason, and without the added burdens such as a notary and doctor’s 

signatures. It would not change any State laws regarding deadlines 

or voter ID requirements. 

I certainly hope that this Congress will expand absentee voting 

and by doing so move forward in fulfilling the American promise 

of democracy: A vote for every citizen. 

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you very much, Congresswoman Davis. 

[The statement of Mrs. Davis of California follows:] 


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Ms. LOFGREN. I don’t know whether members have questions for 

our colleague. 

Mr. McCarthy. You are recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. You have no questions? 

Ms. LOFGREN. I was going to defer to you. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. I will defer to the Chair. I will go after you. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Gonzalez, do you have questions? 

Mr. GONZALEZ. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. And I 

know, Congresswoman Davis, you already pointed out, the only 

thing you are looking for, and many that are supporting what you 

are doing here today, is to give the voter a choice to actually vote 

by mail or drop-off. But you would not be imposing an Oregon-style 

model on any State where it would be the only way that basically 

you would be able to vote. That’s not what you do. You are not replacing the polling place; it is just an alternative that we already 

have in many States, except that it does require an excuse. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. Actually, one of the things that we are 

doing is building on what is already there. Every State allows some 

absentee voting. So you are building on what has been established 

over many, many years in these counties. But this, the excuses 

that we talked about, that people have to demonstrate and have 

the doctors’ or notaries’ signatures, that does not seem to create security at the polls. I think it only creates an additional burden on 

the voter. 

Mr. GONZALEZ. Now, the fears that have been expressed, of 

course, is that this provides greater opportunity for fraud. And 

what would be your response? I know you say that there is no evidence out there. I think we are going to have a witness that will 

testify to the contrary. But what is your experience or your knowledge regarding that particular fear? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. I think we do have some folks here who 

will testify on both sides essentially of that issue. But the check of 

a signature is actually quite substantive and quite different from 

at the polls. I don’t know, Mr. McCarthy, if you recall, we had a 

discussion about this when we were talking about other pieces of 

legislation. And, in fact, that check is significant for absentee voters. And we have even better qualified in some cases and highly 

trained people who are doing that process. We have a gentleman 

who will testify that they have an automatic process in terms of 

the check on signature. 

So I think that there are always going to be a small number of 

problems. We have them whether people are at the poll site or not. 

But we have found that that particular check really does increase 

the opportunities for people and does not increase the fraud. And 

I think there will be folks who will testify on that. 

Mr. GONZALEZ. Thank you very much. I yield back. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. McCarthy. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Thank you. I know we had a conversation, and 

I was just wondering if you could—I noticed you said that you 

haven’t had any knowledge of fraud in absentee ballots; is that correct? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. There is very little over the years that 

has been substantiated in that regard——


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Mr. MCCARTHY. You know there was a Dallas Morning News 

story this week—— Mrs. DAVIS of California. There, again, having a perspective on 

that. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. There is a Dallas Morning News story this week 

and then there is also actually a Postal Service serving 18 months 

that just happened this year. Unfortunately, we are not able to 

have more than one witness, but there are others who have submitted some information. You have the Indiana Democratic Party, 

Dan Parker, he is the chair. He says mail-in absentee vote fraud 

is the only type of vote fraud that has ever been in existence. And 

I think some of their arguments from one standpoint is when you 

go inside the ballot box, nobody is around that can influence. When 

you vote by absentee, no one knows who is around. There can be 

influence around them. 

When you vote by absentee, someone puts it in the mail. I know 

you and I talked about the voter check on the signature. Do you 

think that is sufficient for everybody across the country to have 

that? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. Well, I think it is a strong check. And 

there are ways that, if they receive at the registrar a signature 

that does not match, they contact that individual. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. They contact them now? Like if I voted in Kern 

County and my vote did not count, they would call me? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. Yes. I know that from personal experience because my husband’s signature has gotten less legible than 

it used to. 

Ms. LOFGREN. He is a physician. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. So everybody who votes gets contacted? Because 

I have had a different experience. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. It depends. I can’t speak for every county, but I know that—— Mr. MCCARTHY. How does that work? If I vote absentee, isn’t it 

in California there are certain people that can—you cannot turn in 

your absentee—you could also turn it in at a polling place and it 

could not be you who turns it in. Who all can turn in an absentee 

ballot? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. If it is signed, my understanding is that 

somebody can bring it to the polls. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Anybody could? If I am a neighbor, I could pick 

it up and turn it in if they signed it? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. I believe they can, yes. Once that person has voted. Again, you can tell if it has been tampered with 

after somebody has sealed it. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. One of my prior jobs was working for a member 

who was on this committee and we did many contested elections. 

One was Charlie Rose, who happened to be Chair, and we found 

voter registration absentees were a great deal. One happened to be 

Dornan and Congresswoman Sanchez. And in California you can 

only be a relative. And in L.A., one of the contested races when 

they were going through—what they do is when they send it in, 

you sign it, they run the absentee, which the ballot is inside, and 

they don’t open it until they check. So they put on and have one 

person checking, based on the voter registration, to see if it has 


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ever changed. On there it asks you what member of the family you 

are. If you leave it blank, they assume you are a member and count 

it. If you put in that you are a neighbor, they throw it away. And 

they never contacted that person that it was going through. So I 

have some concerns from that perspective. 

Now on your slide, you put up Tennessee as one of your States. 

Is your goal here to get greater turnout for Tennessee, because absentee would provide that? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. The goal is to allow someone who wants 

to vote absentee to be able to do that without an unnecessary burden of having a notary sign that, of having a physician—perhaps 

your physician is not available to be able to sign for you that you, 

in fact, are ill and are not able to go to the polls that day. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. What was the percentage you said in Tennessee? 

Because they had a problem such as that, correct? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. About 1 percent request absentee ballots in Tennessee; 1.7 percent. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. And you believe—and that is based upon that 

they have to get a physician’s signature? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. I don’t know what it is based upon. I 

am just suggesting that that is a very low percentage of people requesting absentee ballots. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. How many people in Tennessee vote early voting? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. A larger number vote early voting. And 

we actually had some numbers and we wanted to check those thoroughly. But I don’t believe—I don’t know how they put those together. But we have the 1.7 percent of those who request absentee 

ballots. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. California has absentee. How many vote absentee in California? Is it 30 percent? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. It depends on the number. I think, as 

they will testify in Santa Barbara, far larger numbers than that request absentees or have permanent absentees. And, again, you 

have high voting turnout in those particular communities. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Unfortunately, I am sorry, we had a couple of 

witnesses that have studied this and are experts in it. And their 

argument from one standpoint is on the studies that absentee voters turn out more when it is a local election, but when it is taken 

over the whole State you don’t get greater turnout. Tennessee, you 

said, there was 1.7. But I have a fact that 50 percent of them vote 

early voting. I would love to be able to question them and go back 

on their statistics. Is that because they can vote 2 weeks in advance, vote in shopping centers and others, is that why they are 

not requesting absentee because it is fulfilling the need? They 

know they are going to be gone that day at work. We are solidifying their problem, but the other fact they have is you don’t get 

a greater turnout. 

So I wish that we would be able to have that dialogue and that 

debate, but unfortunately we won’t today. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. As I testified, sometimes it is a few percentage points. But if you count those up nationally it is a significant number. 


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Ms. LOFGREN. I will just make one comment and then get to our 

witnesses. One of the arguments that is made in opposition to absentee ballots is that somehow there might be undue influence. 

And this has always mystified me because the person who asked 

for the absentee ballot gets to fill it out wherever they want. They 

can fill out at the dinner table or in the backyard. It is their choice. 

I don’t see how you could ever be oppressed by that when it is 

the voter making the decision on what they want to do. I mean, 

do you understand that? 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. I don’t understand that. I know that 

certainly in families we also influence one another in our—— Ms. LOFGREN. We try. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. We try. Exactly. I remember—maybe 

you have had this experience—of going to a door and asking for 

somebody and them saying, ‘‘You talk to me.’’ You don’t talk to the 

person you just asked for. 

Obviously there is a certain amount of influence, but again, you 

point out that they are doing that by choice. And I think that certainly in California we have very complicated ballots. And I think 

that is one reason why absentee voting is very popular because 

people can take the time. They don’t feel stressed, they are not 

standing in line, they are not worried if a machine is going to 

break. All those things. 

And I think across the country, you want to have it equal. So everybody who has a desire to be able to vote in that frame is able 

to do that. It does not put any pressure on them to do it, but it 

does allow them to do it, and I think the map is quite striking that 

we haven’t had any kind of a universal plan—up until this time, 

hopefully. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you very much. And with that, we will ask 

you to join us up here on the panel and we will ask the next witnesses to come forward. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Madam Chair. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Yes. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. As we have been discussing over the past few 

days, I would like to make my request again that Mr. Curtis 

Gans—who is in the audience today and we have submitted his testimony—be allowed to testify and answer questions as part of the 

second panel. I strongly believe that as this is the subcommittee 

that conducts oversight of Federal elections and considers legislation effecting the way in which Federal elections are administered, 

it is crucial that this subcommittee hear from and have the opportunity to question witnesses with the broadest spectrum of opinions 

as possible. I ask again that Mr. Gans be invited at that time to 

the panel. 

Ms. LOFGREN. I would be happy to make his testimony a part of 

the record by unanimous consent. And I will just say that I think 

this is a stunt on your part, Mr. McCarthy. I got this letter, it was 

late. If you were serious, you would have talked to me personally. 

I am not ruling out the opportunity to do various ratios in the 

future. The majority has the responsibility to set the agenda in the 

Congress. Certainly when the Republicans were in the majority, 

that was the case. And I am not going to be willing to deal with 

a stunt here the day of the hearing. 


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I would note also that by practice the majority also always issues 

the invitation to the witnesses, and the minority has varied from 

that practice in this case, which I find disrespectful. 

So with that, we will ask the witnesses to come forward. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Madam Chair, I ask unanimous consent that the 

written testimony of Mr. Curtis Gans be included in the record. In 

addition, the minority has just received written testimony from Indiana Secretary of State, from John Fortier from the American Enterprise Institute, and from Norm Ornstein. I believe that they 

have some important opinions to share with us on this topic and 

I ask unanimous consent that their written statements—— Ms. LOFGREN. Without objection, the written statements will be 

entered into the record. 

[The statement of Mr. Gans follows:] 


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[The statement of Mr. Rokita follows:] 


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[The statement of Mr. Fortier follows:] 


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[The statement of Mr. Ornstein follows:] 


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Ms. LOFGREN. Will the witnesses please come forward. 

I would like to first introduce Ruth Goldway who was appointed 

Commissioner of the United States Postal Regulatory Commission 

by President George W. Bush in November 2002 to serve a second 

term ending in 2008. She was first appointed by President Clinton 

in April of 1998. The PRC oversees the rates and classification system of the U.S. Postal Service. Ms. Goldway has written on postal 

matters for national newspapers and submitted congressional testimony. 

She represents the Commission on the State Department Delegation to the Universal Postal Union. Born in New York City, Ms. 

Goldway attended the Bronx High School of Science, earned a 

bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan and received a 

master’s in English literature from Wayne State University. 

Next, Deborah Markowitz, the Secretary of State of Vermont, is 

joining us. She was elected Vermont’s Secretary of State in 1998 

and is currently serving her fifth term in office. During her tenure 

Secretary Markowitz has made it a priority to improve Vermont’s 

democracy and promote good citizenship. She has created resources 

to help Vermonters participate more fully in their annual town 

meetings and develop civics education curriculum materials, and 

implemented an ambitious election reform agenda. 

Secretary Markowitz is widely respected as one of the most 

knowledgeable resources in the State on legal and ethical issues for 

local officials and she has presented locally and nationally on effective leadership skills. 

Secretary Markowitz received degrees from the University of 

Vermont and Georgetown University Law Center. She was a founding director of the Vermont League of Cities and Towns Municipal 

Law Center and the founder of the Vermont Women’s Leadership 

Initiative. She is the immediate past President of the National Association of Secretaries of State and serves on the board of advisors 

for the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. 

Joseph Holland is the Clerk of Santa Barbara County. He was 

first elected to the Office of the Clerk, Recorder and Assessor on 

March 5, 2002 and reelected to a second term on June 6, 2006. He 

currently manages an $18 million budget and 120 staff employees 

encompassing three functional divisions: Assessor, Elections and 

Recorder. 

Mr. Holland earned his bachelor’s and master’s degree in economics from UC Santa Barbara and graduated from the UCLA Anderson School of Business in 2001. 

And finally Jonathan Bechtle, the Director of Citizenship and 

Governance Center at the Evergreen Freedom Foundation, the minority’s witness. Mr. Bechtle serves as Director of Evergreen’s 

Freedom Foundation, Citizenship, and Governance Center, a think 

tank advocating for liberty, free enterprise and responsible government. Prior to joining EFF, he served as the senior legal assistant 

for a nonprofit legal advocacy firm in the Washington, D.C. area. 

He also worked as an aide to State senators in both Georgia and 

the State of Indiana. Jonathan earned a juris doctorate from the 

Oakbrook College of Law in Fresno, California. 

And we welcome all of you. 


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STATEMENTS OF RUTH GOLDWAY, COMMISSIONER, POSTAL 

REGULATORY COMMISSION; DEBORAH L. MARKOWITZ, SECRETARY OF STATE, VERMONT; JOSEPH HOLLAND, CLERK, 

SANTA BARBARA COUNTY; AND JONATHAN BECHTLE, DIRECTOR AND LEGAL ANALYST, CITIZENSHIP AND GOVERNANCE CENTER, EVERGREEN FREEDOM FOUNDATION (EFF) 

Ms. LOFGREN. And if we could begin with you, Ms. Goldway. 

I would note you have seen the little machine there. We are operating under the 5-minute rule. We would ask that your testimony 

be about 5 minutes. You will notice I am not too heavy on the 

gavel. When the yellow light goes on, it means you have a minute, 

and when the red light goes on it means you have used the whole 

5 minutes. Your full statements will be made a part of the written 

record. 

So we would ask, Ms. Goldway, if you could begin with your 5 

minute statement. 

STATEMENT OF RUTH GOLDWAY 

Ms. GOLDWAY. I will do my best to be brief. 

Chairwoman Lofgren, Ranking Member McCarthy and members 

of the subcommittee, I appreciate the opportunity to present my 

views at today’s hearings. I have served as Commissioner at the 

Postal Regulatory Commission for 9 years. I would say that I am 

familiar with how the mail stream works, how 700 million pieces 

of mail are delivered each day, and how reliable our Postal Service 

is. 

My comments reflect my personal views, not those of the Commission as a whole. 

Like this subcommittee’s Chair and Ranking Member, I am also 

from California. And since the introduction of voter choice permanent absentee registration there in 2002, I have witnessed, myself, 

that absentee ballots have become ever more popular; and in California, they were over 40 percent of the vote in 2006. We found 

that it works. 

And I applaud the efforts of Representative Susan Davis, another 

Californian, for putting forward legislation to expand the opportunities for absentee ballots and vote-by-mail throughout the Nation. 

In 2000 and 2002, absentee ballots accounted for about 16 percent of the votes cast nationally. However, there was a great disparity between those States that allow no-excuse absentee ballots 

and those restricting them. And while about 29 States currently 

allow for no-excuse absentee ballot, even many of those require requests for absentee ballots at each election, a requirement that 

may limit a citizen’s use. 

Offering citizens the option of voting by mail provides significant 

advantages, including the potential to increase voter turnout for 

national, State, and local elections. Voters would not need to take 

time off from work, find transportation, locate the right polling 

place, get baby-sitters or rush through critical yet sometimes complicated ballot initiatives. 

As the former Mayor of Santa Monica, I know how important 

these initiatives are. Voters appreciate the opportunity to read a 

ballot slowly in the privacy of their homes, and to drop it in the 

mail, exercising their voting franchise thoughtfully and carefully. 


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We all know that public confidence in the accuracy of vote counting is at an all-time low. Yet in the national polls, the Postal Service is rated as the most trustworthy of Federal Government institutions. I advocate voting by mail because the U.S. mail provides a 

secure way for citizens to cast their ballots. In fact, it is against 

the law, a Federal crime to tamper with the mail, and the U.S. 

Postal Service employs the U.S. Postal Inspection Service to ensure 

the security of the mail throughout. 

I am an advocate of the advantages of a verifiable and transparent paper trail offered by mail voting. The Postal Service can 

provide a system of hardcopy distribution and collection that many 

voters believe is the best way to protect their votes. 

After seeing the decline in first class mail due to the Internet, 

the Postal Service began working with State and local officials to 

promote its election mail program and to make that process simpler and more accountable. The Service has designated election 

mail representatives in field offices throughout the country to work 

with election officials, and has created a section on its Web site entitled ‘‘Election Officials’ Mail Resources.’’ It has developed an election mail logo for the exclusive use of election officials’ mailings 

that makes election mail easily identifiable as it moves through the 

mail processing system and alerts mail handlers to promptly move 

the mail to the voter or back to the appropriate local election official. 

The intelligent-mail bar code technology currently being implemented by the Postal Service for bulk mailers could be adapted for 

use with ballots, thereby allowing voters to check on the location 

and status of their vote by entering a tracking number by phone 

or over the Internet. 

After the 2000 elections, at the urging of Congress, the Postal 

Service developed an expedited national standard to handle overseas ballots for military and U.S. Government personnel called the 

APO-FPO Ballot Express. Similar procedures can and should be developed for local and State mail-in ballots. National standards regarding the counting of ballots, based on postmark rather than the 

arrival in the election office, should be evaluated by Congress in 

consultation with the Postal Service, as should the idea of establishing a first class stamp as the uniform ballot rate regardless of 

the ballot’s weight or size, or instead offering prepaid postage for 

mail ballots. 

The U.S. Postal Service is the only Federal agency that provides 

truly universal and reliable service to every resident 6 days a 

week. It should be called upon to meet the latest challenge to the 

integrity of our democracy resulting from the electorate’s distrust 

of electronic voting and their skepticism about the truthfulness of 

electronic election outcomes. 

As a regulator of the Postal Service I will do what I can to ensure that the election mail process becomes an important part of 

the mail stream and that service standards for the various classes 

of mail are consistent with the unique needs of election mail. 

As a citizen, I am here to support mail-in ballots as a secure and 

efficient alternative to in-person voting, I think it is a win-win proposal. 


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Thank you, Chairwoman Lofgren, Ranking Member McCarthy 

and members of the subcommittee. I respectfully request that my 

written statement be included in the record and I will be happy to 

answer any questions you may have. 

Ms. LOFGREN. It will be entered in the record. 

[The statement of Ms. Goldway follows:] 


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Ms. LOFGREN. Secretary of State Markowitz, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF DEBORAH L. MARKOWITZ 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. Well, thank you so much. Thank you, Congressman Lofgren. I want to begin by thanking you for inviting me to 

come speak to you here today, and thank the committee members 

for taking this testimony. You do have a copy of my written testimony and I thought I would sort of make some highlights—highlight certain parts of it. 

First of all, I was first elected in 1998. In that election there 

were about 10 percent of our voters voting by no-excuse absentee 

voting. And indeed it was 1991 that Vermont first dropped the requirements for an excuse in order to get an absentee ballot. And 

I would like to note that it was a couple secretaries—a couple before me who really promoted this effort. He is currently our Governor, Jim Douglas, a Republican. So in Vermont it was not seen 

as a partisan issue at all. 

Since 1998, my office has made a great effort in educating our 

public about their rights under the law generally. And as a result 

of some great collaborations we had with particularly our business 

community, the chambers of commerce, our largest employers, and 

with the organizations that work with our low-income Vermonters 

and also Vermonters who are not confidently literate, we have increased participation from 10 percent in 1998 to 20 percent. This 

is participation using the absentee ballot. And so in this last election, we had over 20 percent of our voters choose to vote using the 

absentee ballot. 

What we have learned in Vermont essentially is that voters really like having this option. We could not turn away from it. Our voters really like having the convenience of voting by mail or stopping 

off at the town clerk’s office to pick up a ballot to mail it in later. 

We find actually that it is the bigger elections where more voters 

are interested in using an absentee ballot. It is the Presidential 

elections, because people are worried about lines at the polls. And 

people feel more interested and compelled to make sure their vote 

is cast. 

What we have also found is our elections administrators really 

like this option. They were afraid in the beginning as the numbers 

grew that it was going to be too much work for them. But what 

they found instead is that it spreads the work over a period of 

time. You can begin voting by absentee ballot 30 days in advance 

of the election. And what they found is that it spreads the workload so that on Election Day there is less pressure, there are fewer 

lines, and things run for smoothly. 

That being said, I would suggest that there are a couple of safeguards—important safeguards that you take into account as you 

look at possible legislation and as you evaluate this for the country. 

First of all, in our elections systems we want to have transparency 

and accountability at every step of the way. And one of the ways 

with our absentee ballots that we do this in Vermont is, it is public 

record who has requested an absentee ballot; it is public record 

when that ballot is mailed; and it is public record when it is returned. And that allows the campaigns, the candidates, it allows 

the public to let us know if they think there is any funny business, 


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because it is transparent. People know who is voting early and who 

is voting by mail. 

In Vermont, we investigate all reports of violations. We take that 

very seriously. I think that is important. But we found that the 

best way to prevent problems is with good training and public education. We train the election workers, we train the campaign workers, because campaigns like absentee ballots because it is a way to 

reach hard-to-reach voters and to make sure they actually vote. It 

is easy to get them to say, yes, I support the candidate. But it is 

harder to get them to take that second step which is to actually 

cast the ballot. 

We also have a very strict bipartisan process of handling the ballots and I think that is critical. There needs to be, at every step 

of the way, systems in place to prevent collusion, to prevent fraud. 

And as the ballots are received and processed, it is with pairs of 

election workers who are a check and a balance against each other. 

We have procedures in place to preserve voter privacy. If I get 

one concern from the public it is: Will people know how I vote or 

not? And so it is important to have very transparent measures for 

protecting that privacy. 

And, finally, it is important to have public education so that folks 

know if they are going to vote 28 days in advance, things might 

happen that might lead them to change their mind and they don’t 

get that ballot back. Once it is submitted, it is as if it is in the ballot box. You can’t get it back. It is important for the public to understand how the process works. 

I am very happy to take your questions and I want to thank you 

again for inviting me. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you. 

[The statement of Ms. Markowitz follows:] 


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Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Holland. 

STATEMENT OF JOSEPH HOLLAND 

Mr. HOLLAND. Chairwoman Lofgren, members of the subcommittee, thank you for having me here. I am County Clerk for 

Santa Barbara County, and as the registrar of voters it is my duty 

to run the elections for Santa Barbara County. I am also a member 

of the board of directors for the California Association of Clerks 

and Election Officials, and as a member of this board, I am also 

heading up an ad hoc vote-by-mail committee that is focused on 

identifying relevant issues and best practices for California counties in providing vote-by-mail voter services for California voters. 

California has had no-excuse absentee voting since 1978. With 

the advent of no-excuse absentee voting, Californians have increasingly chosen to vote by absentee ballot in each election. In the most 

recent November general election, over 40 percent of the votes cast 

in California were ballots cast through the mail. 

If you will look at your first attachment in the handout that I 

provided you, there is the history of voting in general elections in 

vote-by-mail in California dating back to 1976—or 1978. And you 

can see that with the advent of no-excuse absentee voting, it really 

did not start off all that quick. It was a gradual increase to get to 

where we are right now, but with this increase we do expect it to 

continue to grow at this rate. 

Beginning in January 2002, new legislation took effect that allowed California voters to sign up to become permanent absentee 

voters. By registering with permanent absentee status, California 

voters are assured of being mailed an absentee ballot to their residence 29 days before each and every election. This permanent absentee status remains in effect until the voter fails to cast a vote 

in two consecutive statewide elections. 

Permanent absentee voting has proven to be very popular in 

California. For those counties that have chosen to promote this voting choice, we are seeing as much as 50 percent of the registers 

voters signing up for this. In Santa Barbara County, 85,000 voters 

are signed up as permanent absentee voters. This represents 48 

percent of the 183,000 registered voters in the county. 

If you turn to the second chart in your handout, there is the 

Santa Barbara County absentee voting as a percent of registration 

or total ballots cast. And you can see it was very low back in the 

1970s. But today, as a total of ballots cast, over half of the ballots 

cast in Santa Barbara County are cast absentee. In the June primary it was 60 percent. 

Many people ask, Does the increase in absentee voting lead to 

higher turnout? In my opinion it does. Let’s look at the statistics 

for Santa Barbara County. On average, going back to 1998 and 

through 12 general primary and special countywide elections, we 

find that absentee voters return their ballots at a 74 percent rate. 

That is on average. This compares to an average polling place turnout of 52 percent for the same period. 

Now if you turn to the next chart in my handout, you will see 

down at the right there in the yellow, I have highlighted it, and 

those are the return rates. There is a 52 percent return rate for 


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the polling place over those 12 elections; 74 percent return rate for 

absentee ballots. 

Now if you turn to the next chart in the handout, what I did was 

I just put together a quick little scenario here. If you look at the 

top box, that is the current situation in Santa Barbara County with 

48 percent absentee voters; 48 percent of 183,000 is 88,191 voters. 

If they return their ballots at a 74 percent rate, that is 65,000 ballots returned. 

For the polling place voters there are 49.6 percent; that is 91,000 

times 52 percent, 47,000. So what you get is 115,000 returned ballots using those statistics. That is almost a 63 percent turnout rate. 

If we go back to the 1990s in scenario two when Santa Barbara 

County only had 25 percent absentee, you apply those same statistics and you can see that we are only going to get 106,000 voters 

actually voting, for 58 percent. 

So just with this little—these are just pure statistics, we are 

showing that by increasing your absentee voting, here was a 5 percent increase. And if you went from no absentee voters to more, 

then you could increase it even more. 

There are a lot of issues involved with absentee voting. I have 

a list there going from cost, security, to voter file maintenance. I 

am happy to answer questions on any of those, and thank you very 

much for having me. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you very much. 

[The statement of Joseph Holland follows:] 


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Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Bechtle, we are pleased to hear from you now. 

STATEMENT OF JONATHAN BECHTLE 

Mr. BECHTLE. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman and members of 

the committee. My name is Jonathan Bechtle and I am an attorney 

and director of the Voter Integrity Project at the Evergreen Freedom Foundation, which is a nonprofit nonpartisan group in Olympia, Washington. 

My purpose today is to share my concerns about the proposal to 

expand the use of mail ballots. Washington’s elections are almost 

entirely vote-by-mail, and based on the State’s experience I believe 

that vote-by-mail is an inherently insecure system because election 

officials cannot verify who received the ballot, who actually votes 

it, and who actually returns it. 

There was an incident recently in Washington that I thought illustrated this well. There was a woman named Jane Balogh from 

a suburb of Seattle who was disturbed about the insecurity she saw 

in Washington’s election system. So she decided to call attention to 

the problem by registering her dog, Duncan, to vote. She sent a 

registration form in for Duncan and subsequently received a ballot 

for him in the mail. She did not actually want to cast an illegal 

ballot, so she wrote void across the ballot and stamped it with a 

paw print on the signature line. 

Of course, she quickly got a phone call from election officials asking about the odd signature, and she explained what she was 

doing. They said dogs actually cannot vote in our elections. But the 

dog received ballots in two more elections before he was finally removed from the registration rolls. 

Under our vote-by-mail system, if Jane had actually used a signature on that ballot instead of a paw print, she could have cast 

those ballots, they would have been counted, and no questions 

would have been asked. 

While Jane did not exploit the weakness of vote-by-mail by casting illegal ballots for her dog Duncan, our 3-year investigation of 

Washington elections has shown that is not always the case. Due 

to the inherent insecurity of vote-by-mail and mail ballots, compounded by voter roll errors and misplaced trust in signature 

verification, hundreds of mail ballots have been cast unlawfully by 

ineligible voters. 

Washington State had a historically close Governor’s race in 

2004. By our research over 1,600 absentee ballots were miscounted 

or cast unlawfully in that election. That was 121⁄2 times the 133 

vote margin of victory in the Governor’s race. It wasn’t a grand 

conspiracy by anyone; it was individual acts by voters made possible by an insecure vote-by-mail system. 

The 2004 election wasn’t just a fluke. We have continued to find 

mail ballots unlawfully cast and counted. Last year we filed 30 

complaints of double voting using mail ballots, and nearly all of 

them have been verified by law enforcement to be illegal double 

votes. We also have found that the insecurity of vote-by-mail is 

compounded by errors in the voter roll. Every flaw in the State’s 

voter roll becomes a potential vote, because if the person is active 

on the roll, they get a ballot under vote-by-mail. 


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So every dead voter, every noncitizen, and every felon on the 

rolls will get a ballot. Every duplicate registration will get two ballots and some of these will be unlawfully voted. 

For example, a county in Washington mistakenly sent out 3,500 

ballots to voters twice, so the voters received two ballots. 230 of the 

voters returned both of those ballots, and 35 percent of those were 

counted despite security measures designed to prevent that type of 

double voting. 

Vote-by-mail insecurities are often obscured by a misplaced trust 

in signature verification. The reality of signature checking in 

Washington’s election system is that it was done by a crew of temp 

workers who, after a few hours of training by the State patrol, are 

expected to sift through thousands of mail ballots trying to subjectively determine if the signatures match. We found dozens of situations where two ballots were cast by one voter with completely different signatures, yet they were both counted, and I included some 

of those in my packet that I turned in today. 

Unlike a polling place where trained workers can monitor who is 

voting and who is signing the poll book, mail ballots cannot be 

properly monitored. This has been demonstrated not just in Washington State but across America. I have submitted also a list of the 

many instances of absentee ballot fraud nationwide, as well as 

quotes from election and law enforcement experts of all political 

stripes who believe mail ballots are a primary source of voter 

fraud. 

Now, the desire to make voting more convenient or easy is an admirable one, but it shouldn’t be done at the cost of security. Our 

investigation of Washington’s vote-by-mail system demonstrates it 

is an inherently insecure system that has harmed public confidence 

in elections. A 2006 poll of Washington voters found that 53 percent of the voters in our State believe that voting fraud is a serious 

issue facing us. 

So in the interest of ensuring security and confidence in our elections, I would recommend against requiring or encouraging the unfettered spread of mail balloting. Thank you for your time. 

[The statement of Mr. Bechtle follows:] 


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Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you all for your testimony. 

Those bells that were ringing tell us that we have votes on the 

floor. We have one 15-minute vote and two 5-minute votes. So I 

think that given that there are questions, I am sure, for all of you, 

I wonder if we could agree to come back. Usually it takes us longer 

than 15 minutes, but to be back here at 3:30 and we will get to 

our questions. And, again, thank you very much for your testimony, 

and we are in recess until 3:30. 

[Recess.] 

Ms. LOFGREN. Well, we said 3:30, and it is not too bad for Congress time. It is 3:37. So we will now begin the time in our proceedings when we can engage in questions under the 5-minute rule. 

And I would like to recognize first Mr. Gonzalez for his 5 minutes of questioning. 

Mr. GONZALEZ. And I thank the Chairwoman. 

The reason she is deferring to me is that I am going to have to 

absent myself in a minute, so I apologize to the Chair and my colleagues here, but there is a markup in Energy and Commerce, and 

I have to discuss some parts of the bill with some individuals. I will 

be brief. 

Mr. Bechtle, like any system, there is cost-benefit analysis and 

such, and so there are always different concerns and factors. One 

that we seek, of course, is increase in participation. You do that by 

making it more convenient for people to vote. I know there are 

many people out there who really don’t understand that, even with 

early voting in Texas and such, it is still difficult for individuals 

to vote. And so that is why I find the no-excuse mail ballot such 

an attractive proposition. 

But you pointed out what was an obvious abuse; that was by 

Jane—I guess it is Balogh? In Texas, you register to vote, right? 

And then you get a voter registration. So I take it that this dog had 

a voter registration? Or how did it work in that State? 

Mr. BECHTLE. Right. She filed a voter registration form for the 

dog. 

Mr. GONZALEZ. And did the voter registration also bear a paw 

print. 

Mr. BECHTLE. No. She must have put a signature on the—— Mr. GONZALEZ. Oh, exactly. That is what I am getting at, you 

see. 

Mr. BECHTLE. Right. 

Mr. GONZALEZ. And I know that that is a—it is kind of a cute 

example but so misrepresentative of what really is going on out 

there. What really happened there—I don’t know the facts of that 

case, but it tells me that there was a voter registration card obtained invalidly and fraudulently, and she should have been prosecuted for that. It was a cute trick, then, to cast the ballot when, 

in fact, she was already party to obtaining the voter registration 

fraudulently. So I think we have to be real careful with that. 

But don’t you think that, given what we already have experienced in other States where fraud has not been demonstrated but 

an increase in voter participation has been experienced, isn’t this 

a worthwhile endeavor in what we are seeking, some of us here in 

Congress, especially Congresswoman Davis? 

Mr. BECHTLE. Thank you for the question. 


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I talked to a lot of different audiences in Washington State about 

this issue, and I agree that this is a convenient system; it is convenient for the voters. 

But when I have talked to voters about, ‘‘Do you want a convenient system,’’ and then also talk to them about, ‘‘Here are the problems we have seen in Washington State,’’ I have never had someone come to me and say, ‘‘I wouldn’t mind doing a little extra to 

make sure that my ballot is secure.’’ They don’t want to give up security just for the sake of convenience; they want that to be balanced. 

And that is what we are going for here. Convenience is not the 

end goal here. It must be convenient and secure. And we don’t see 

that in this system, from our experience. 

Mr. GONZALEZ. There is no absolute guarantee that any system 

is not subject to some sort of fraud. It is just a question of degree. 

And, I mean, people would love to say, why would we have any system that would allow any kind of fraud? Well, that is the reality. 

And I am just saying I think we have to really look at the big picture. 

I will share some of your concerns; I just don’t think to the degree that you do. And I just think that we really need to have a 

really good-faith debate on the issue. 

And so, with that, I will yield back. Thank you very much. 

Ms. LOFGREN. The gentleman yields back. 

The gentleman from California is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Well, thank you, Madam Chair. 

If I could ask the Secretary of State Markowitz—is that correct? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. Yes. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. In your comments, you had stated that you 

weren’t the Secretary of State at the time that thought of the idea 

of going to absentee ballots, no excuse. 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. That is right. It was before my time. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. So how long did it take to implement? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. Oh, it was implemented immediately. Well, you 

know, because there was already——

Mr. MCCARTHY. Well, no, the person that started it is Governor 

now. How long did it take from when he requested it to it being 

implemented to the voters? How long did it take to do it in the 

State? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. You mean how long was it debated in the State, 

or how long did it take to implement it once it was passed? 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Once it was passed. 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. Oh, it was inconsequential; it was immediately 

implemented. And that is because we had a system already in 

place for absentee ballots for people with excuses. All it took was 

changing the forms. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Just changing the forms. 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. Just changing the forms, yes. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. So you already had the absentee balloting. How 

much would a State take that doesn’t have any absentee balloting 

to go into absentee balloting? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. Well, every State has some kind of excuse absentee ballots. So I believe that every State would have the same 


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experience. It would mean, you know, printing up new forms that 

have taken out the excuse provisions. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. And do you use the computer, like they do in 

L.A., to check the signatures? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. We don’t. And, in fact, in Vermont, we don’t 

have signatures; we don’t require a signature. We don’t require signatures for voters coming in either. 

Instead—understand, Vermont is a small, rural place, so I am 

not sure that I would recommend this system for L.A. County, you 

know, for larger, urban areas. But, in Vermont, the accountability 

comes from the fact that we all know each other, in our smaller 

communities especially, and we have this transparency and accountability. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. So if I mail it to you, it is just because I wrote 

on the front my return address? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. No, no, you still have to sign. You are signing 

a sworn affidavit, and it is on the envelope. We don’t do a signature 

match, though. We don’t keep a signature for voters, and we never 

have. We haven’t had any problems——

Mr. MCCARTHY. But if I showed up at the poll, you would know 

me because you had seen me. If I voted by mail——

Ms. MARKOWITZ. No, we also trust you. So we might know you, 

or we might not know you. But you come in and you state your 

name. There are poll watchers, who are observing. It is a public 

process, and if they know that you are not you, they can say, ‘‘Hey, 

I am challenging. I don’t believe he is him.’’ And, in fact, in the last 

election, we had a person coming in to vote for his father——

Mr. MCCARTHY. But if I mail one in, and I didn’t give it to the 

post person and I gave it to the mailbox, how do you know I did 

it? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. Because it is on the public record, and so if 

somebody knows that it could not have been you, they will report 

that. 

In fact, in the last election, we had that happen, where, in the 

town of Stowe, there was a belief that a father voted a ballot for 

a daughter. And it was investigated and, indeed, found that the 

person who believed a certain set of facts was indeed mistaken, and 

the daughter swore that it was her own ballot. So it was followed 

up with. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. If I could ask Ruth Goldway, in your bio, it says 

you are postal regulation committee. Is that correct? 

Ms. GOLDWAY. Commissioner, yes. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Commissioner, yes. And then you stated—correct 

me if I am wrong—from the standpoint that you felt absentee balloting was rather safe, one of the safest. 

Ms. GOLDWAY. Yes. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Have you had, as the postal regulator, any history or any knowledge of any problems with absentees going 

through the mail with any postal workers? 

Ms. GOLDWAY. No, I have no knowledge of complaints regarding 

missing absentee ballots. We have received occasional complaints 

about missing mail of one sort or another, but we have certainly 

never received anything about absentee ballots. And to the extent 


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that we receive complaints about missing mail, it is more likely advertising mail. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. More that. 

Are you familiar with—here is a January 20, 2007—a postal carrier had been sentenced to 18 months in jail and found guilty of 

conspiracy to prevent others from exercising their right to vote, 

where they actually took the ballots when they came. There was 

13 other people charged in the process. 

Ms. GOLDWAY. I am not familiar with the case. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Is there any chance, based upon the job that you 

have as postal, that you can request from the Postal if they have 

had any reports in any other place such as this one, of someone 

going to jail, that is causing any problems? 

Ms. GOLDWAY. I would be happy to. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Okay. I appreciate that. 

If I could—Santa Barbara. You made the statement—and this 

was interesting, because, unfortunately, there are some people—

and I tried to get to the bottom of it, too. In my household, my wife 

votes absentee and I go to the ballot box. 

And part of your conversation is you think it gives you a greater 

turnout, because 70-some percent of those who apply for absentee 

ballots return them, and of those who go to the ballot box it is only 

52 percent, correct? 

Mr. HOLLAND. On average. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. On average. Is there any deadwood on those that 

are just on the voter file, though? Do you still have deadwood, or 

have you cleaned all that out? 

Mr. HOLLAND. If you look at the statistics on the chart that I 

have up there, you can see, if you go back to 1998, that——

Mr. MCCARTHY. You had more. You had 200-and-some-odd——

Mr. HOLLAND. We had 244,000——

Mr. MCCARTHY. And now you are down to 190-something——

Mr. HOLLAND. And now we are down to about 183,000. I think 

you will see the same trend across the State of California, because, 

with vote by mail, you tend to better maintain your voter file, because you are sending absentee ballots. If they come back, then——

Mr. MCCARTHY. In California, I can also select what I got in the 

mail this week, permanent absentee ballots. So once I send that 

back in, you will always send me a absentee ballot, whether I request it or not, correct? 

Mr. HOLLAND. That is correct. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. How do you check when somebody moves, knowing the mobility of people? 

Mr. HOLLAND. Well, what we do is, about 120 days before each 

and every election, we send a postcard to all permanent absentee 

voters reminding them that they are an absentee voter, that they 

will be receiving a ballot, and if they have changed their address, 

to let us know. If we get those back as undeliverable, then we outreach to them again to try and get their correct address. 

And then, if you are not a permanent absentee voter, we are actually sending you an application to ask if you want to be an absentee voter. Again, if we get that back as undeliverable, then we 

will outreach to those folks too. 


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So what we are doing is we are better maintaining the voter file 

that way, in addition to all our regular voter-file-maintenance efforts. But this is really just an outreach effort as part of our ongoing absentee process. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. And then, if I could just refer back to the Secretary of State, just since I have you here, because this committee 

had another debate on H.R. 811. Are you familiar with it, Holt’s 

bill? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. Yes. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Do you support that? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. I support pieces of it. I—— Mr. MCCARTHY. Do you support the bill entirely, as it is written 

today? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. I have would have to take a look at all the provisions before I could tell you that answer. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Okay. 

Madam Chair, I don’t know if this is an appropriate time, but I 

have several articles that I referred to during questioning that I 

ask unanimous consent to enter into the record. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Without objection, they will be entered into the 

record. 

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Ms. LOFGREN. And the gentleman’s time has expired. 

I now turn to the gentlelady from California, our colleague and 

the author of the bill, Congresswoman Davis. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. Thank you. Thank you very much. 

Thank you to all of you for being here. 

Secretary Markowitz and Mr. Holland, I am just wondering, in 

your communities, if you announce that no longer were people able 

to vote no-excuse absentee balloting, what do you think the reaction would be? 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. Well, I would very shortly lose my office. You 

know, our voters in Vermont think this is really a terrific asset. 

And actually, the thinkers, the political scientists, in Vermont who 

spend time looking at, you know, who isn’t voting and how can we 

encourage them to vote, see voting at home as the way to reach 

those voters. 

In Vermont, we have a problem with literacy, particularly with 

a number of our adults. And we find that a person who is not confidently literate or a person who has disabilities that wouldn’t prevent them from coming to the polling place but make them uncomfortable doing so are much happier taking their time at home with 

the ballot and sending it back by mail. 

Mr. HOLLAND. And in Santa Barbara County, I think there 

would be a huge uproar about it. People are very comfortable having that choice. And, as I see it, absentee voting, or permanent absentee voting, is about choices. It is about improving services for 

our voters. And they would be very upset. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. Yes. 

Mr. Bechtle, you sounded like you thought that the voters in 

Washington State were very uncomfortable with the process in 

their State. What do you think would be the reaction? 

Because, actually, as I read the statistics, it looks like it has 

caught on like wildfire in Washington State. But you are saying 

that you think people are really uncomfortable there. Is that correct? 

Mr. BECHTLE. Not quite, Representative. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. But if they did away with that process, 

what do you think the reaction would be? 

Mr. BECHTLE. Well, I think it depends on whether you told folks 

and explained to them the reason why there were concerns about 

it. I think that if all they are hearing is that it is more convenient 

and that it is going to be easier to do, yes, it is a very popular system. But when you talk to them about, well, here are the problems 

that there are, then they say maybe, you know, I would like to 

change back the poll voting. And I know lots of folks who have 

made a change back to poll voting because of the concerns they 

have had with vote by mail. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. That is interesting. Because it certainly 

looks like if it is spreading and people had a level of confidence, 

I guess I would wonder whether, in fact, they have the questions 

that they do. But I appreciate your response. 

I wonder, Commissioner Goldway, you mentioned tracking of 

mail and overnight packages and that using a bar code is a pretty 

inexpensive system. I actually have an interest in this, as I think 

you know, for tracking absentee ballots. And I am just wondering 


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what you think, what is the best way to do that? And are there advantages or even disadvantages to trying to track by bar code, so 

that people know when the ballot is received by the registrar, when 

it is actually verified by the registrar and actually goes into the 

count. 

Ms. GOLDWAY. The Postal Service is developing and is currently 

implementing on a pilot project an intelligent mail bar code for all 

automated mail, which would mean all bulk mail and all advertising mail. It would not necessarily be needed for an individual 

letter. But any mail that was provided by an election official could 

easily have that bar code, as well. 

And what they are anticipating is that, by 2009, all the mail that 

has these bar codes will be tracked within the Postal Service system. The Postal Service will know when it is received and when it 

gets to the letter carrier, so that if the election officials can work 

with the Postal Service to develop a supplementary code that 

tracks when the ballot leaves the printer to go to the voter or when 

the ballot is received at their office and then is tracked through the 

system to be counted and verified, et cetera, you could have a 

seamless system for very little money. Because the technology is already there, and it is bar code technology, which has been used for 

20 years. It is a question of just getting the systems to coordinate. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. Yes. I wonder if you, just quickly—I 

know that my time is up—just the question of whether the fraud 

and error rate of absentee voting versus poll voting, how that 

stacks up. Do any of you have, I guess, a figure commenting on 

that error rate of absentee voting versus poll voting? 

Mr. HOLLAND. In my opinion, I think that absentee voting or voting by mail is actually just more secure and less chance of fraud. 

In Santa Barbara County, in our mail ballot processing center, 

we have cameras on everything. Anybody that works there has an 

ID badge to get into the facility. We have a separate room where 

we store our ballots that has cameras in there. Our election computers are in a separate room with cameras. It is a very secure environment. 

And, again, we check those signatures against the signatures on 

file in our database. And those signatures that are on file in our 

database have been checked against the State database to make 

sure that they have a California driver’s license number that 

matches that shows that they haven’t voted anywhere else. 

So there are a lot of checks, and, to me, it is very secure. And 

I think that there are some opportunities for fraud at the polling 

place and more opportunity for error. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. Mr. Bechtle, I am just going to let you 

respond. And do you have a rate that you believe is a fraud rate, 

either for absentee voting or at the polls. 

Mr. BECHTLE. I don’t, but I would be happy to do some research 

and get an answer to that back to you, if you would like. 

Mrs. DAVIS of California. Great. Thank you very much. 

Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Madam Chair. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Yes? 


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Mr. MCCARTHY. At the end, I just want, pursuant to the House 

Rule XI clause, hereby request that minority members of the Subcommittee on Elections be granted a minority date of hearing on 

the matters related to expanding and improving opportunities of 

the vote by mail. 

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Ms. LOFGREN. This will be dealt with according to the rules. 

Now I am going to engage in my brief questioning. I know that 

the Secretary of State has to leave for the airport, so I will be 

quick. 

I just want to say that the idea of one first-class stamp being 

enough for postage is such a good idea. I hadn’t really thought of 

that before your testimony today. And I remember, I think it was 

last year—in California, we have these initiatives. And the weight 

of this thing, and people didn’t—in the end, the County of Santa 

Clara paid the difference, and people didn’t know if their vote 

would count, and in some counties it didn’t. So that is really a good 

idea, and I thank you for sharing that with us. 

I would like to ask—Mr. Bechtle has raised a series of concerns 

in his testimony. And I am wondering, the two witnesses we have 

here who actually run elections, if you have any comments on those 

concerns and how they can be dealt with, if at all, or whether you 

share those concerns. 

And maybe we can start with you, Ms. Markowitz, since I know 

you have to leave. 

Ms. MARKOWITZ. Thank you so much. 

You know, when you are making decisions and considering voting systems, you are always making a cost-benefit analysis of some 

sort. And I would suggest that there is no perfectly secure way of 

voting. You know, in Vermont, we had somebody come in and vote 

for his father. His belief was that he was voting the way his father 

told him. You know, he was picking up his prescription, and he was 

doing chores, and this was just another chore. 

And so, I think the challenge for election administrators is public 

education, so the public knows what is required of them. 

You know, we hear statistics a lot about felons improperly voting. 

And part of the time, in many cases, it is because they don’t know 

they no longer can vote. They are not aware of that rule. Of course, 

in Vermont, felons can vote from prison. I mean, we have a different rule. In fact, we elected a Congressman, you should know, 

from prison; he won re-election from prison. 

So it is a cost-benefit analysis. And, in my view, the risk of fraud 

is low. The issue is whether or not there is a risk that a person 

voting at home will be the subject of undue influence. And we don’t 

have a record of that. We don’t have any indication that that is 

true. 

And the way I think we would be able to see it if it were happening is we would be receiving complaints. We would hear rumors, it would come to the surface, and then be prosecuted. 

But without real good evidence that there are abuses and fraud, 

you know, why would you limit something that obviously the public 

likes quite a bit? It is a big benefit to those of us who run elections 

on Election Day by reducing the lines, by making it less crazy. And 

it give us a measure of control over those ballots. 

And you heard from Ms. Goldway that, you know, people like 

voting by mail because it is a paper vote in places where they are 

not comfortable with the machines. You know, you have heard also 

that there can be many safeguards in the opening and processing 

of those votes to prevent problems on Election Day and problems 

with accounting. 


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So I would suggest that it has been very successful in Vermont, 

and I don’t see why it wouldn’t be successful in other places. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Holland. 

Mr. HOLLAND. Thank you. 

Mr. Bechtle did mention one thing I jotted down to note. He said 

that he had an instance where somebody voted twice. That can’t 

happen. When your absentee ballot hits our mail ballot processing 

center, we immediately know that you voted, and you can’t send in 

another ballot, because we will know that you voted. It would be 

like, ′′Whoa, where did you get this other ballot?′′ Well, of course, 

we have never had that happen. There is a unique ID on that ballot. 

We had one case where a woman whose husband had died 2 days 

before she signed his ballot. Well, our signature-verification machine kicked that out, and we did not allow that ballot to be voted. 

The lady ended up getting a letter from the District Attorney’s office. 

But those are just two examples of how we are managing the security of our vote by mail. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you very much. 

I just, before we close, I just would like to know—we got a call 

from the Secretary of State’s office in the State of Washington, and 

they wanted to correct the record on the dog-voting incident. I am 

going to report what that said, which is that Washington only requires residency and that the woman, the dog owner, changed the 

name on her utility bill to the dog’s name, and then sent that bill 

in with the absentee ballot, and that she was prosecuted. 

So I would just note that, although we want to make sure that 

we have safe and secure elections, we also want to make sure that 

people have the ability to vote. 

And I think—I was walking over to the vote on the House floor 

with Mr. Gonzalez, and we were talking about primary elections. 

In California—we are always in Washington on primary elections. 

I love going—I mean, I am one of those people who just loves Election Day. I mean, I love to go down there. I used to like it as a 

little kid when I was volunteering. But I can’t do that; I wouldn’t 

be able to vote at all on primary election day. 

So, really, it is a very popular initiative. I think, really, your testimony has been food for thought. 

And I really do appreciate, again, Congresswoman Davis for the 

leadership that she has shown in bringing this matter forward. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Madam Chair, can I have a point of personal 

privilege? 

Ms. LOFGREN. Certainly. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Just to correct the record. You had stated earlier, from one standpoint, you said something that I had done was 

a stunt, that you received a letter on Friday. I just wanted to correct that I provided the letter within 24 hours of the notice on 

Wednesday, that I did talk to you in person Monday night, but I 

did try to get a hold of you. You called me over the weekend, got 

my voicemail, unfortunately. I called you back within 2 minutes. 

Unfortunately you were busy, and your staff would not provide me 

a cell phone. 


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So, one is it is not a stunt, asking that we have parity. Two is 

I talked to you in person. Three, I gave it on Wednesday. 

I do believe in the concept that—I understand I am not in the 

majority. But every 10 years, we take a census and we make these 

districts equal. I represent Republicans, Democrats, independents, 

Green Party. And I don’t believe that they are any less than constituents of any other district. And I just believe, when we take 

election law forward, that it is equal to, especially based on what 

has gone on in this committee in the past, that we maintain the 

ability to have ideas on both sides, so we are well-informed. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Before we recess—I don’t want to unduly delay 

this. I just will say I didn’t get the letter until later than you delivered it; I don’t know why. I do believe that your behavior here 

today has been in the stunt category, but hopefully we will be able 

to move beyond these kinds of antics in the future. 

And this hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 4:04 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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