# Voting 2026 - Good, Bad, and Ugly **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [October 9, 2026, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700 "2026-10-09T16:24:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/21 "2026-10-13T20:47:36Z")
Got notified this morning that my ballot has been received and the signature verified. It should be counted in the next couple days. They don’t make any results public until election day. ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/22 "2026-10-13T21:07:03Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > Washington State is 100% vote-by-mail (and has been for a number of years) but our ballots haven’t arrived yet, just the voting pamphlet so far Our Washington Ballots arrived Saturday. Yours should be there today or tomorrow, hopefully. > [@Bayaker](#): > > I like to vote in person on election day, so I always print it out from the county website and research (as much as possible) every race that I’m not already informed about - mostly judges. Thank you for that. I just saw some research on judicial races. 1/3 of voters leave them blank. 1/3 chose based on name alone, and 1/3 try to make an informed vote. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/23 "2026-10-13T21:19:13Z")
It’s very hard, at least around here, to find out anything much about judges other than what positions they’ve held. I do try. ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/24 "2026-10-13T21:29:07Z")
Our voters guide is fairly good, but the position statements are vague. Endorsements are key. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/25 "2026-10-13T21:39:29Z")
> [@Procrustus](#): > > Our Washington Ballots arrived Saturday. Yours should be there today or tomorrow, hopefully. It wasn’t in the mail when I checked Sunday, I bet it’s sitting in my mailbox now. Thanks for the heads-up. 🙂 > [@Procrustus](#): > > Endorsements are key. Often that’s what I go on for a lot of those nonpartisan positions. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/26 "2026-10-13T22:03:19Z")
I live within a few hundred yards of my polling site and would walk there if it weren’t for the busy street I have to cross. I will vote in person as is my custom. As I live deep in MAGA territory, I don’t really expect shenanigans at any of our polling stations, and my biggest hope is Tom Cotton loses to Hallie Shoffner. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/27 "2026-10-13T22:11:08Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > It wasn’t in the mail when I checked Sunday, I bet it’s sitting in my mailbox now. Thanks for the heads-up. 🙂 You know, it occurs to me that Monday was a federal holiday, so I don’t think anything would have been delivered. My preview of mail expected today didn’t include ballots (I signed up to get those from USPS). So it probably isn’t there. I also usually get a text when they mail out my ballot and haven’t seen it yet. I went to the ballot portal: > **[VoteWA Voter Portal](https://voter.votewa.gov/portal2023/login.aspx?returnurl=home.aspx)** I put in my info and it says: > **Ballots for the GENERAL 2026 election have not yet been prepared. They will be sent out on 10/14/2026.** I live in King County and I think because there are so many people it takes longer. At least I know when it’ll go out though. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/28 "2026-10-13T22:30:13Z")
Here’s something on potential shenanigans with the voting this year. Don’t know how much to credit it. > **[Trump Is Building an Election Trap, and Millions of Americans May Not See It...](https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2026/10/9/800109899/community/trump-is-building-an-election-trap-and-millions-of-americans-may-not-see-it-until-its-too-late/)** > > Something stinks. Astoria is one of my favorites on the Oregon coast, a small town of around 9,000 people with great restaurants and crafts shops. Two of them, a coffee shop and ceramics studio… ---
**Author:** ![PhillyGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ed655f/32.png) [@PhillyGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PhillyGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/29 "2026-10-13T22:42:29Z")
> [@DavidNRockies](#): > > **EITHER VOTE IN PERSON OR USE THE BALLOT BOXES.** > > Please. My wife and I voted by mail today. In the very unlikely event Pennsylvania’s ballot status web site does not show our ballots received by election day, we will explain that when voting in person. I don’t think the preference for drop boxes, over mail boxes, is solidly evidence-based. And one can find anecdotal evidence as one wishes: [Associated Press 2024: Fires set in drop boxes destroy hundreds of ballots in Washington and damage 3 in Oregon](https://apnews.com/article/vote-ballot-drop-box-democracy-fire-f66c52f774955106fb9e7c8172825cff) I can see Trump trying a stunt such as – just picking one unlikely scenario out of many possible – ordering the postal service to discard ballots mailed within a week before election day. But then the whole election is invalid. However, I should note that our county election office agrees with you. The ballot packages we received, in the mail, this past Saturday, said that depositing ballots in a drop box, or at the country courthouse, was preferred to U.S. mail. ---
**Author:** ![Aspenglow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspenglow/32/76_2.png) [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/30 "2026-10-13T22:49:03Z")
It’s always the same two instances above that are cited for the “unreliability” of drop boxes. If those are the only two instances you can find, against millions of ballots submitted in this way, you might rethink how “evidence-based” your views are with respect to drop boxes. Please note that THREE ballots were damaged in Oregon. And those THREE individuals were contacted and encouraged to resubmit their ballots. I will be using a drop box here in Oregon. Assuming I get my ballot through the US Mail. And if I don’t, I’ll be standing in line at my elections office, or crawling over broken glass to get there, to ask for a provisional one. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/31 "2026-10-13T23:08:45Z")
I mailed mine early enough that it’s already back at the Board of Elections and counted. Of course it helps that they mailed them early; you can’t vote by mail until you’ve gotten your ballot. I would be reluctant to mail anything to anyone unless I had 2 weeks for it to get there, and there was still time before the deadline to react after that loss to forestall whatever consequences there will be for it getting lost. Whether that reaction is voting in person, or paying the same bill online. Saying nothing of partisan shenanigans, whether centralized or stochastic individuals. The overall timeliness performance is not what it once was, at least not around here. ---
**Author:** ![ParallelLines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/parallellines/32/3575_2.png) [@ParallelLines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ParallelLines)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/32 "2026-10-13T23:09:06Z")
My mail in ballot arrived last Wednesday (I had gotten a text notification 48 hours prior to that), but I just finished filling it out today because I was travelling out of state from Thursday through Sunday. This year I had an extra resource that I consulted in addition to everything else I find online, which was Indivisible’s voting guide for my region. > **[Colorado Ballot Initiatives | IndivisibleNOCO](https://www.indivisiblenoco.com/colorado-ballot-initiatives)** It didn’t decide anything, but helped confirm a lot of other things I saw/read. And of course, I’ll be out at No Kings on Saturday, so, it all ties in. Still, absolutely going to drop our ballots at the secure drop-off this Friday and wait on my confirmation. ---
**Author:** ![PhillyGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ed655f/32.png) [@PhillyGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PhillyGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2026, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/33 "2026-10-13T23:37:04Z")
> [@Aspenglow](#): > > It’s always the same two instances above that are cited for the “unreliability” of drop boxes. All the voting methods are reliable, with exceptions being rare unless you wait until the relative last minute. One hypothesis of mine is that low social trust fuels populism. So I’m a little reluctant to say you cannot trust the post office. And I think they prioritize election mail. Also, if you tell people that the easiest way to vote is to avoided, there will be more procrastination. However, this isn’t something where I am sure I am correct. Maybe procrastinators skew MAGA. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2026, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/34 "2026-10-14T01:01:33Z")
> [@Aspenglow](#): > > It’s always the same two instances above that are cited for the “unreliability” of drop boxes. If those are the only two instances you can find, against millions of ballots submitted in this way, you might rethink how “evidence-based” your views are with respect to drop boxes. Compare that to the hundreds of mail thefts that occur every year. > **[Why Mail Theft Is On the Rise](https://time.com/6999321/mail-theft-rising/)** > > Mail theft is booming, but experts disagree about the reasons. > [@PhillyGuy](#): > > One hypothesis of mine is that low social trust fuels populism. So I’m a little reluctant to say you cannot trust the post office. And I think they prioritize election mail. My concern is that elections are handled by state entities, but the USPS is federal, and part of the executive branch. It’s unlikely that they’d get involved in any shenanigans but more likely than local election workers (especially for me in a very blue county in a blue state). Plus, it’s not like it’s a huge inconvenience to drop my ballot in a drop box rather than the mail box. ---
**Author:** ![Aspenglow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspenglow/32/76_2.png) [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2026, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/35 "2026-10-14T01:16:15Z")
> [@PhillyGuy](#): > > So I’m a little reluctant to say you cannot trust the post office. I’ve relied heavily on the postal service for the past 40 years to assist me in the work I do. They were always wonderfully reliable and I boosted them a lot. But ever since Trump put them in his sights as a way to fuck around with mail-in voting, I’ve watched that service deteriorate substantially. I’ve had a significant amount of important mail go walkabout for weeks or disappear altogether. It got so bad, I dressed down the character who is currently responsible for delivering my mail and told him that if the situation didn’t improve, I would make it my mission in life to get him fired. Things did get better after that. But I’ll never trust mail service again like I did before Trump. Contrast that with 22 years of using drop boxes where my ballot has found its way to the elections office without fail. It’s an easy choice for me. The postal service has changed. People should know that before they blithely drop their ballots in a US Mail box. ---
**Author:** ![Prof.Pepperwinkle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/prof.pepperwinkle/32/13627_2.png) [@Prof.Pepperwinkle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Prof.Pepperwinkle)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2026, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/36 "2026-10-14T01:35:29Z")
Madame P. and I have mailed in our ballots, and I checked, and they said they received 'em. ---
**Author:** ![Aspenglow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspenglow/32/76_2.png) [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2026, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/37 "2026-10-14T01:46:08Z")
And that will likely be the experience of most voters who use regular mail. But the State of Oregon has been specifically targeted by this regime due to being an all-mail-in-ballot state. As @Atamasama points out above, the USPS is under federal control. That alone gives me the willies when it comes to handling my ballot. ---
**Author:** ![PhillyGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ed655f/32.png) [@PhillyGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PhillyGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2026, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/38 "2026-10-14T01:48:58Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > My concern is that elections are handled by state entities, but the USPS is federal, and part of the executive branch. It’s unlikely that they’d get involved in any shenanigans but more likely than local election workers (especially for me in a very blue county in a blue state). Well, yes, in your case. The leadership of the Democratic Party is not [literally calling for cheating](https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/trump-tells-supporters-cheat-hell-092940521.html). I’m not saying that GOP election judges are going to cheat, but the risk is higher than in the past. The American Postal Workers Union mostly or always endorses Democrats. I wonder what they would do if ordered to open ballots and discard those for one party. I think that we still are at a point where they would refuse. > [@Atamasama](#): > > Plus, it’s not like it’s a huge inconvenience to drop my ballot in a drop box rather than the mail box. Where I am, it is at least a mile to the drop box and across the street to the mail box. And one person can only deposit one ballot in the manned drop box (it is supposed to be yours), not one person putting the whole family’s ballots into the mail box. So if it is inconvenient enough that fewer people would vote without the U.S. mail option. Maybe I shouldn’t care on the theory that Democrats are more determined voters. As for dopers, I do not think it is an issue, at least in states where you can easily check ballot receipt. ---
**Author:** ![PhillyGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ed655f/32.png) [@PhillyGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PhillyGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2026, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/39 "2026-10-14T02:09:16Z")
> [@Aspenglow](#): > > It got so bad, I dressed down the character who is currently responsible for delivering my mail and told him that if the situation didn’t improve, I would make it my mission in life to get him fired. Things did get better after that. But I’ll never trust mail service again like I did before Trump. This sounds like a different thread but I will try to just focus on the voting angle. I hate to say you are correct, because as I wrote before, I think general distrust, especially of the government, helps populists. But I have to admit to substantial increase, over the past year or two, of my mail, and that of my neighbors, going to the wrong house, wrong street, or even wrong town. I would not jump to the conclusion that it is the fault of my mail carrier (maybe he is catching most of the bad barcode sorts before it gets to us), or that it is the fault of a Trump administration initiative (when exactly did it start and when was new equipment ordered?), or that election mail (correctly barcoded in advance) is getting misdelivered. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2026, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700/40 "2026-10-14T18:20:34Z")
We have early in-person voting in my county. I went this morning and did the deed. 2-minute line, no hassle. I am told that early voting is the least likely to be messed-with, in comparison to mail-in voting and election-day voting. Plus, if there’s anything wrong with your registration, you have some time to fix it, and you don’t need to wait 3 hours in line to find out. So I hope everyone will consider early voting if it’s available in your area. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voting-2026-good-bad-and-ugly/1033700.md?page=3)