How to make sure your vote counts, and other advice from Miami-Dade County’s elections chief

With over 100,000 mail ballots already cast in Miami-Dade County, the Nov. 8 midterm election is well underway, and local elections staff is getting ready for early voting to begin on Monday morning.

Last week, Miami-Dade County’s canvassing board began to tabulate mail ballots and ran what staff says was a successful test to make sure all the equipment runs smoothly and accurately ahead of game time. With 28 early voting sites ready to open — and 40% to 57% of voters expected to turn out this year — election officials are urging voters to make a plan early to vote in this year’s midterms.

The Miami Herald sat down with Miami-Dade Supervisor of Elections Christina White to go over what voters can expect at the ballot box. She said she had just one message for voters: “It’s never been easier to vote in Miami-Dade County.”

Q: What has changed in Florida election law since the last major election in 2020? What can voters expect when they go to the ballot box this year?

A: Miami-Dade voters can expect pretty much the same experience that they had back in the 2020 election cycle because some of the changes that occurred in Florida law were already being implemented here in Miami-Dade County.

The big changes are if you want to request a vote-by-mail ballot, or if you want to make any changes to your voting record. It’s now a requirement that you provide us with either your driver’s license number or the last four [digits] of your Social Security number. Before, that wasn’t a requirement, it was added in at the legislative level to provide another layer of security and protection to the voter.

I was keeping an eye on that because I didn’t know if we were going to have people that really weren’t comfortable providing that information and if it was going to cause delays. But I’m happy to say that we really haven’t seen that.

The other big law change was that the vote-by-mail drop boxes needed to be manned during the days and hours of early voting, and we were already implementing it in that way. So we had one small change. There were two boxes in two locations that were offered on the Monday before Election Day and on Election Day that we’re no longer able to have there. But it was a new thing that we did, and it really wasn’t utilized all that much. Aside from that, things are going to be just like they were in 2020.

In terms of the amount of ballots that you can bring with you to drop off at a drop box, what are the rules and has anything changed?

In Miami-Dade, there was always a restriction on the number of ballots that you could be in possession of. That was in place since 1998. So when the state law changed to somewhat mimic Miami-Dade County, there were changes in other jurisdictions from what voters may have done in the past. But not so much for us here.

So the state law and the Miami-Dade County code mirror each other quite similarly. You are allowed to be in possession of your immediate family members’ ballots to drop those off. But beyond that, you shouldn’t be handling them.

There have been some concerns in the past several years about election security, but also balancing that with people making sure that their vote is counted, and that they can access and not have any troubles once they arrive at a polling place. Can you talk about how people in Miami-Dade County can make sure that their vote is counted, but also that there is a secure system and results they can count on?

There’s many things that are in place to make sure that an election is secure. We start planning well, well in advance. We start planning for elections years in advance sometimes because of new technology that we have to purchase and implement.

In terms of security, we have spent significant dollars for both physical security and cybersecurity upgrades to make sure that we have those areas covered and hardened as much as possible. The voter rolls have never been more accurate and up to date. It’s a constant ongoing process for us to do this maintenance and ensure that those people who are on the vote rolls are registered and eligible and those who maybe have died or moved are taken off.

The paper ballot is a very big deal. Voters need to have a lot of comfort in that. In the state of Florida we vote on paper ballots. So we actually have a record of every single person’s vote should we ever need to go back to that in the case of a recount, or if there’s ever any kind of question about the results of the election.

We test all of our voting equipment before we deploy it for an election. And there’s multiple levels of reconciliation that we do. Voters who voted versus votes that have been cast, transfer of custody procedures ... tons of things in between. And then at the end, which should give everybody a little bit more comfort, is that we do a post-election audit. So we’re actually reviewing manually the votes have been cast in the election and comparing them to tabulated results. And so it’s not just one thing, it’s many, many things that are embedded all throughout the process that voters should feel confident in.

How confident are you for this year in Miami-Dade County, in case there is a recount, in case there is a reason after the election to have to come back to ballots?

Oh, we’re very prepared. Like I said, we’ve been preparing for this election for almost a year now. And I have very dedicated staff.

The poll workers have all been trained. We just concluded a very successful primary election. We’re ready to do this again and show our voters that the level of professionalism that is embedded in this election is very high. ... We just need our voters to be ready and to actually come out and participate.

There might be some people that have changed addresses even in the past month or so, especially because of the housing situation that we’re in. Is there any particular message for people who may be nervous that maybe their address doesn’t match their license?

Early voting really is going to be the best option. You can change your address up until Election Day, even at the precinct. But at Early Voting, we have every single ballot style available to you that we can print on demand for you. So you would just come in, change your address right there, and then we can print your new ballot for you.

If you wait until Election Day, it gets a little bit more difficult. If you go into a precinct that’s not your assigned precinct for your new address, we’re going to have to redirect you to the other location.

You can also call the office or come into the office and make the update in advance. So prepare in advance, do it early if you can. But if you can’t, if you walk in, you’re able to do it there as well.

Can you talk about damages to mail ballots? If someone receives a mail ballot, and maybe they open the envelope and it’s ripped or there’s something wrong with that mail ballot? How can they make sure that they can still vote, and that the vote is counted?

We’re able to issue replacement vote-by-mail ballots, that’s not a problem.

If you change your mind on a candidate, if you’ve damaged it somehow, if it got wet from the rain, any reason, all you have to do is call the office and request a replacement ballot be mailed to you. And similarly ... if we’ve mailed you a vote-by-mail ballot, but you decided that you would rather go in person, you can also do that, too.

In terms of dropping off mail ballots, early voting and Election Day, can you talk a little bit about the deadlines to vote?

In Miami-Dade, we offer the maximum number of days and hours that you’re allowed under the law for early voting. So that means that we’re going to be starting on Monday, Oct. 24. We have 28 early voting locations all throughout Miami-Dade; they will be available from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. So really it is maximum convenience for our voters; you can choose to go anywhere throughout the entire day. That was the same model that we used in previous general elections.

For vote-by-mail, the deadline to request a ballot is going to be Saturday, Oct. 29. So if you’re somebody who wants to vote by mail and haven’t yet put a request in, you’re going to want to make sure you do that as soon as possible.

In terms of getting it back to us, the deadline is Election Day. So we have to have your ballot in our possession no later than 7 p.m. on Election Night. Not in the mail, not postmarked — in our possession.

There is a provision in law that allows us to notify you if there is an error with your ballot. Say you forgot to sign it or your signature doesn’t match. Then, you have an additional two days to correct it. So if you wait until Election Day to provide us that ballot, and you forgot to sign it, you’re not going to have very much time to correct it.

So my message is either get out to vote very early or return your ballot to us early.

There’s been a lot of changes because of redistricting. What’s your advice to people who may not know if their polling place has changed or where they are in terms of their districts?

Leading up to the primary election, we mailed all of our 1.5 million voters a new voter information card, so they should have that with their name, address, all their new districts on there if they were impacted by redistricting, as well as their polling place. So they can refer to that.

But also the website. You can go to the website, put in your name and your date of birth and find out everything about your voting record, in terms of where to vote, what districts you’re in.

Another really simple thing to do leading up to this election is to look at your sample ballot. Number one to just be familiarized with redistricting if you were impacted, but also to start doing research on the candidates and questions. We have six [ballot] questions in Miami-Dade County. So you’re going to want to definitely take advantage of reviewing those in advance, doing some research, and not looking at them for the very first time when you’re in the act of voting.