If you’re able, vote in person, lessen confusion

To the Editor:

The midterm elections will be highly contentious, the vote will be challenged and rejected, and mail-in ballots will be contested.

In the 2020 election, the number of mail-in ballots grew to 1,300,000, an increase over a projected 250,000 mail-in ballots based on historical voting patterns.

Data from the 2020 election indicated that wait times for voting in person were less than two minutes with the exception of the first few days of early voting. Poll workers at the in-person voting locations were only marginally busy, while workers worked long hours opening, verifying and counting the mail-in ballots.

New identification requirement will lead to a substantial increase in rejected mail-in ballots with the number of rejected mail-in ballots greater than the margin of victory in many races. Additionally, the voter will need to log in to the Secretary of States’ website to verify that their mail-in ballot has been received and accepted.

Challenges to the election results can be minimized if the number of mail-in ballots can be reduced by in-person voting.

Your help is needed to encourage voters, if they can, to vote in person.

Please note that I use the phrase “if you can,” as I am aware that many voters have significant health concerns and do not want to risk going into a polling place. I am not in any way expecting these voters to vote in-person. Furthermore, I am not advocating making it more difficult for a person to vote by reducing a voter’s options for casting their vote.

— Mark Zwecker

Atlanta