[1]2008 General Election Turnout Rates, United States Elections Project, available at
http://elections.gmu.edu/Turnout_2008G.html.
[2]42 U.S.C. § 1973ff et seq. The UOCAVA was passed in 1986 to "update and consolidate provisions of current law relating to absentee registration and voting in elections for Federal office by members of the uniformed services and by citizens of the United States who reside abroad." H.R. Rep. No. 765, 99th Cong., 2nd Sess., at 5 (1986). The predecessor statutes were the Overseas Citizens Voting Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1973dd, and the Federal Voting Assistance Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1973cc.
[3]Exec. Order No. 12,642, 53 Fed. Reg. 21,975 (June 8, 1988).
[4]42 U.S.C. § 1973ff1(1).
[5]Cases Raising Claims Under The Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, Civil Rights Division, U.S. Department of Justice, available at
http://www.usdoj.gov/crt/voting/litigation/caselist.php#uocava_cases
[6]H.R. Rep. No. 765, 99th Cong., 2d Sess. 1011 (1986).
[7]Best Practices for Facilitating Voting by U.S. Citizens Covered by the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, Report of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (2004); available at
www.eac.gov.
[8]The authors collected data by email and telephone inquiries from 19 of the largest states with military voting populations, including: Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Delaware, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas, West Virginia, and Wisconsin. These states combined have nearly 60 percent of the military voting population.
[9]The FVAP collects and provides data regarding the total number of military voters in each state, including Minnesota. These figures are available at
http://www.fvap.gov/reference/laws/stateinitiatives.html.
[10]Minnesota state data indicates that election officials rejected nearly 8.2 percent of cast military absentee ballots, whereas only 0.5 percent of all absentee ballots statewide were rejected. See Sheehan v. Franken, No. 62CV0956, Findings of Facts, Conclusions of Law, and Order for Judgment, at 9 (Minn. Dist. Ct. Apr. 13, 2009), available at
http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/electionlaw/litigation/documents/MNfinalorder.pdf.
[11]See Edward Blum, An Assessment of Voting Right Progress in Mississippi, American Enterprise Institute, available at
www.aei.org/docLib/20060417_MississippiStudy.pdf; Edward Blum and Lauren Campbell, Assessment of Voting Rights Progress in Jurisdictions Covered Under Section Five of the Voting Rights Act, American Enterprise Institute, available at
www.aei.org/docLib/20060515_BlumCampbellreport.pdf.
[12]Overseas Vote Foundation, 2008 OVF Post Election UOCAVA Survey Report and Analysis, at 20 (Arlington, VA: Feb. 2009) (2008 OVF Report).
[13]Defense Manpower Data Center, Human Resources Strategic Assessment Program, 2006 Survey Results on Voting Assistance Among Military Members and DoD Civilian Employees, Survey Note No. 2007010, at 2 and Table 1 (May 7, 2007) ("2006 DMDC Survey").
[14]Id.
[15]Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act Survey Report Findings, September 2007, U.S. Election Assistance Commission, at 1, Tables 21c and 22; available at
www.eac.gov.
[16]Id. at Tables 21c, 22, and 25a (showing that 658,855 ballots were not returned by the voter (992,034 - 333,179) and 34,458 ballots were returned to the local election jurisdiction as undeliverable).
[17]Id. at 1 and Table 25a.
[18]The estimate is based on data collected from 19 states (see footnote 8, supra) which showed that only 325,000 military voters out of approximately 1.5 million requested an absentee ballot for the 2008 presidential election.
[19]Under Sections 5 and 7 of the National Voter Registration Act, state motor vehicle driver's license offices as well public assistance agencies must provide voter registration opportunities to individuals using those offices. 42 U.S.C. §§ 1973gg3 and 1973gg5.
[20]See 10 U.S.C. § 1566(i)(1).
[21]Id. § 1566(f)(2).
[22]Department of Defense Inspector General, Evaluation of the Voting Assistance Program, Report No. IE2005001 (Mar. 31, 2005),
http://www.
dodig.mil/inspections/IE/Reports/Final_VoterAssistanceProgram.pdf).
[23]Id. at 17, 22.
[24]Id. at 25.
[25]Id. at 22.
[26]Id. at 26.
[27]DOD Inspector General, Evaluation of the Voting Assistance Program, Report No. IE2007004 (Mar. 31, 2007), available at
http://www.dodig.mil/inspections/IE/Reports/Final_2006%20Federal%20Voting%20Assistance
%20Program_Mar%202007.pdf; see also H. Con. Res. 388, 110th Congress (2008).
[28]Id. at 6.
[29]Id.
[30]Defense Manpower Data Center, Human Resources Strategic Assessment Program, 2006 Survey Results on Voting Assistance Among Military members and DoD Civilian Employees, Survey Note No. 20007010, Table 1 (May 7, 2007).
[31]2008 General Election Turnout Rates, United States Elections Project.
[32]Id.
[33]The estimate is based on data collected from 19 states (see footnote 8, supra) which showed that approximately 106,000 of the 325,000 that were sent to military voters in the 2008 presidential election were not returned by the voter.
[34]U.S. Government Accountability Office, Operation Iraqi Freedom: Longstanding Problems Hampering Mail Delivery Need to Be Resolved, Report No. GAO04484, at 13 (Washington, D.C.: 2004).
[35]Id.
[36]Id. at 15.
[37]See Government Accountability Office, Operation Iraqi Freedom: Longstanding Problems Hampering Mail Delivery Need to Be Resolved, GAO04484, at 1012 (April 14, 2004). However, the same study found that nearly 25 percent of test letters sent to war zones took more than 18 days. Id. at 13.
[38]The state deadlines for mailing and receiving absentee ballots from military voters have been compiled in the FVAP's "Voting Assistance Guide," available at
http://www.fvap.gov/vao/guide.html.
[39]Sheehan v. Franken, No. 62CV0956, Findings of Facts, Conclusions of Law, and Order for Judgment, at 9 (Minn. Dist. Ct. Apr. 13, 2009), available at
http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/electionlaw/litigation/documents/MNfinalorder.pdf.
[40]H.R. 5673.
[41]S. 3073.
[42]H. Con. Res. 388.
[43]S. 1265.
[44]S. 1415, Sec. 9. Schumer's bill was passed by the Senate on July 23, 2009 as Amendment No. 1764 to S. 1390, the FY10 National Defense Authorization Act.
[45]S. 1415, Sec. 5. See also Amendment No. 1764 to S. 1390, the FY10 National Defense Authorization Act.
[46]H.R. 2393 and S. 1026. Such a requirement is also contained in Senator Schumer's bill, S. 1415, in section 5. However, the bill does not provide the DOD with a date certain by which it must collect absentee ballots or guarantee the return delivery of these ballots. In short, this bill fails to provide any assurance that the overseas military ballot will be returned to the United States in order to be counted.
[47]This limitation is apparently in the bill because John E. Potter, United States Postmaster General, protested to the Senate that no private company should be allowed to interfere with the USPS's monopoly on mail service. See Letter from John E. Potter to Senator Robert F. Bennett, Ranking Member, Committee on Rules and Administration, United States Senate (June 10, 2008).
[48]10 U.S.C. § 1044 (2008).
http://www.heritage.org/Research/LegalIssues/lm0045.cfm
