How to check if your vote was counted
Once you vote in the 2020 presidential election, how do you check to make sure your ballot has been counted? This answer varies depending on where you live and how you voted.
There is no standardized national system for tracking whether your ballot was counted. The ballot tracking landscape is a “mess, because it’s 50 different systems, and within each of those 50 systems, there [are] county registrars, so everybody has slightly different methods,” said Jessica Levinson, a professor and expert on election laws at Loyola Law School.
When you vote in person, you can see your vote be submitted and it’s “a fair bet” that your ballot will count, Levinson said.
Paul Mitchell, vice president of the California voting data firm Political Data Inc., noted that it’s incredibly rare for an in-person vote to be discarded in his state: “If you vote in person, the only thing that could happen is a meteor could strike your polling place five minutes after you leave, and then your vote wouldn’t get counted.”
As such, no state offers ballot tracking for in-person voting.
But when you mail in your vote, you don’t see it being processed and there’s more opportunity for mistakes to be made, so most states offer some form of confirmation for those ballots.
“People are worried about vote-by-mail because they’re not the ones physically putting it in somebody’s hands or putting it in the box, and I think that’s why the tracking is so much more robust,” Levinson said.
By and large, mail-in votes end up counting. Nearly 92% of returned mail-in ballots were counted in the 2018 general election, according to a survey by the federal Election Assistance Commission. Among the most common reasons those ballots were rejected were that the voter was not actually registered to vote; the ballot was missing an important document, such as an affidavit; the ballot was not received in time; the signature on the ballot did not match the signature on file; or the ballot lacked a voter’s signature.
Sometimes people can only vote a provisional ballot at their polling site, and these ballots often need follow-up from either the voter or election officials. If this happens to you, ask your local election official to explain how you can check to see if your provisional vote was counted or rejected. A written explanation is your legal right under the Help America Vote Act.
If you want to double-check the status of your vote, here are your options by state:
Alabama
You can check the status of your absentee ballot online. If you have further questions, contact your local election office.
Alaska
Track your absentee ballot status at myvoterinformation.alaska.gov.
Arizona
The Grand Canyon State offers both absentee and provisional ballot tracking at my.arizona.vote, and some counties go a step further. In Maricopa County, for example, you can sign up for text updates on your mail-in ballot.
Arkansas
View ballot status by entering your name and date of birth at the Arkansas elections website.
California
You can look up your mail-in ballot status and also sign up to get text or email notifications as information is updated.
Colorado
Colorado offers status updates and alerts for mail-in ballots.
Connecticut
See if and when your absentee ballot was received.
Delaware
The state offers look-up service for both absentee and provisional ballots.
District of Columbia
In D.C., you can check your absentee ballot status online. If you are asked to cast a special ballot, check its status here.
Florida
The Sunshine State offers tracking for mail-in ballots. For help with provisional ballots, contact your local elections office.
Georgia
Both absentee and provisional ballots can be tracked at the state’s “My Voter Page.”
Hawaii
Residents can head to ballotstatus.hawaii.gov to see if their mail-in vote was received.
Idaho
Enter your info in Idaho’s voter record tool to check your mail-in ballot status.
Illinois
Although some counties use mail-in ballot tracking software (Cook County has portals for both suburban residents and those in the city of Chicago), Illinois offers statewide tracking only for provisional ballots. Check your local election authority for absentee ballot tracking information.
Indiana
Check if your ballot was received and counted with Indiana’s “My Voter Portal.”
Iowa
Absentee ballot tracking is available for the entire state. Contact your county auditor for questions about provisional ballots.
Kansas
Kansas offers tracking for mail-in ballots.
Kentucky
Nervous about your absentee ballot? Check its status with a statewide tool.
Louisiana
The state’s “Geaux Vote” portal offers tracking information for mail-in ballots.
Maine
The Pine Tree State has a statewide tool for tracking absentee ballots.
Maryland
You can check the status of your mail-in or provisional ballot. Provisional ballot status will be made available 10 days after the election.
Massachusetts
Find out if your mail-in vote was rejected or accepted attrackmyballotma.com. You can check if a provisional ballot was counted by calling 1-800-462-VOTE after Election Day.
Michigan
You can track the status of your absentee ballot. For provisional ballots, Michigan recommends contacting your city or township clerk’s office.
Minnesota
You can see if your mail-in ballot was received and counted. Minnesota, one of the few states with same-day voter registration, is not required to offer provisional ballots.
Mississippi
Mississippi does not use statewide ballot tracking software. If you have doubts about your vote counting, contact your county election official.
Missouri
Although some jurisdictions offer tracking for mail-in ballots, including the city of St. Louis and Calhoun County, Missouri does not have statewide ballot tracking.
Montana
Track your mail-in ballot status at app.mt.gov/voterinfo.
Nebraska
Nebraska offers mail-in ballot status in its voter information tool.
Nevada
The state’s Ballottrax site provides tracking information and the opportunity to sign up for text or email alerts when your mail-in ballot is received and counted.Provisional ballot status will be made available eight days after Election Day and remain available for 30 days. Call (877) 766-8683 to find out your provisional ballot status, according to Nevada’s explainer.
New Hampshire
You can find out when your ballot was received from the clerk’s office.
New Jersey
For the presidential election, in-person votes will be cast by provisional ballot. “All voters can call 1-877-NJVOTER after the election to find out whether their vote by mail or provisional ballot was counted or the reason it was rejected,” the state’s voter information portalexplains.
New Mexico
Absentee ballot tracking is available.
New York
The state of New York doesn’t offer absentee ballot tracking, but New York City and Albany County do. Check your county’s election office.
North Carolina
There’s one system for checking absentee ballot status and another for viewing provisional ballot status.
North Dakota
Mail-in ballots can be tracked at a statewide portal.
Ohio
Ohio offers statewide tracking for mail-in ballots.
Oklahoma
Check the status of absentee ballots at ok.gov/elections/OVP.html.
Oregon
Oregon mails a ballot to every registered voter. They can be tracked at the state’s “My Vote Now” site.
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania will be the first and only state to disqualify ballots that aren’t enclosed in a second secrecy envelope ― and the state offers no chance for voters to fix that rejection. There is tracking for mail-in ballots, but also some quirks you should know about as the system is old and relies on confusing language.
Rhode Island
Check the status of your mail-in ballot at vote.sos.ri.gov.
South Carolina
You can track to see if your absentee ballot has been received, but the state reportedly has no plans to display whether that vote was accepted.
South Dakota
South Dakota’s tracking website will show the date an absentee ballot was received, but not if it was accepted or rejected, the state told HuffPost.
Tennessee
Mail-in ballots can be tracked in Tennessee.
Texas
Ballot tracking is only available for voters who live overseas or serve in the military.
Utah
The state says people whose votes are rejected will be contacted with instructions on how to fix the problem, but voters can also check the status of both mail-in and provisional ballots at vote.utah.gov.
Vermont
Check the status of your mail-in ballot at mvp.vermont.gov.
Virginia
Head to elections.virginia.gov to track a mail-in vote.
Washington
Enter your name and birthdate at the state’s voter information portal and you can see if your ballot reached its destination.
West Virginia
In the Mountain State, you can track the status of both absentee and provisional ballots.
Wisconsin
Voters in Wisconsin can view their election history and track absentee ballots.
Wyoming
“Contact your county clerk for information,” says the website of the Wyoming Secretary of State. The state does publish a single list tracking the ballot status of military and overseas voters, listed by voter ID number.
Janie Campbell contributed reporting.
This article originally appeared on HuffPost.
