National: Here’s why all election officials should pay attention to Kentucky’s primary | Joseph Marks/The Washington Post

Kentucky’s primary contest yesterday marked a rare bright spot after a string of primaries where officials proved wholly unprepared to hold safe and secure elections during the pandemic. The Kentucky primary Tuesday was far from flawless. Indeed, some in-person voters waited up to two hours in Lexington. But the state managed to evade the fate of Wisconsin, Georgia and the District of Columbia where large numbers of requested mail ballots never arrived, poll workers were unprepared and voting lines stretched for four hours and longer. And it did it while shattering the record for primary voter turnout, largely driven by interest in a contentious Democratic primary to take on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). Secretary of State Michael G. Adams (R) predicted total turnout would exceed 1 million voters with a large percentage of them casting ballots by mail, Amy Gardner, Michelle Ye Hee Lee and Elise Viebeck report. The Kentucky situation was a welcome victory after speculation the state could face major primary day challenges — especially because a dearth of poll workers healthy enough to brave the pandemic forced the state to just open 200 polling sites, down from 3,700 in a typical election year.

National: ‘An embarrassment’: Trump’s justice department goes quiet on voting rights | Sam Levine/The Guardian

The Department of Justice (DoJ), the agency with unmatched power to prevent discrimination at the ballot box, has been glaringly quiet when it comes to enforcing voting rights ahead of the 2020 election, former department attorneys say. Amid concern that the attorney general, William Barr, is using the department to advance Trump’s political interests, observers say the department is failing to protect the voting rights of minority groups. Remarkably, while the department has been involved in a handful of cases since Donald Trump’s inauguration, it has largely defended voting restrictions rather than opposing them. The department’s limited public activity has been striking, particularly as several states have seen voters wait hours in line to vote and jurisdictions are rapidly limiting in-person voting options because of the Covid-19 pandemic. “It just seems like there’s nobody home, which is tragic,” said William Yeomans, who worked in the department’s civil rights division, which includes the voting section, for over two decades. “This is especially sad considering the plethora of voting issues crying out for action, from Georgia to Wisconsin.” Until late May, the justice department had not filed a new case under the Voting Rights Act, the powerful 1965 law that prohibits voting discrimination, during Trump’s presidency. (In 2019, it settled a Voting Rights Act case in Michigan that was filed in the final days of the Obama administration.)

National: Trump’s war against mail-in voting lacks Republican allies | Michael Warren, Manu Raju and Marshall Cohen/CNN

Donald Trump's campaign against mail-in voting isn't getting much support from other Republicans, either in Washington or in some key swing states. After Trump tweeted Monday morning that mail-in ballots would make 2020 the "most RIGGED election in our nation's history," CNN spoke with numerous GOP senators, including members of the GOP leadership team. None of them said they agreed with the President's views on mail-in voting, and a number of them said they supported expansions as a way to deal with the coronavirus. "I think it's fine," Sen. Deb Fischer of Nebraska, a member of the Senate GOP leadership team, said of the expansion of mail-in voting in her state. "It's worked well in Nebraska. We had tremendous turnout in the primary in May. No issues that I've heard from our secretary of state. It's worked well." Fischer was joined by several other Republican senators Monday who said they did not believe more voting by mail -- which has been expanding in states in recent years and has accelerated since the coronavirus outbreak began -- would unfairly rig the election.

National: 16 Trump officials who have voted by mail recently, despite Trump’s warnings about it | Aaron Blake/The Washington Post

President Trump spent much of his Monday on Twitter decrying the supposed dangers of voting by mail. And in that effort, he got an assist over the weekend from Attorney General William P. Barr. Appearing on Fox News with Maria Bartiromo, Barr said twice that expanded voting by mail would open “the floodgates of potential fraud.” “Right now, a foreign country could print up tens of thousands of counterfeit ballots, and [it would] be very hard for us to detect which was the right and which was the wrong ballot,” Barr said. Barr’s allegation has astounded election experts, who say something on the scale he’s talking about is simply unthinkable. Basically, localities know who they’ve sent ballots to and would be aware of duplicate ballots or ballots being returned by people who were never sent them. Yet here Barr is raising it again — and with no pushback from the Fox host. Barr’s commentary, though, is similar to Trump’s in one key respect: While warning against the dangers of voting by mail, Barr himself has used it. As The Washington Post reported earlier this month, Barr voted absentee in both the 2019 and 2012 elections. Voting absentee and opposing making voting by mail easier aren’t inherently at odds, it bears noting. One could know that their own absentee ballot is legitimate, for example, while believing that expanding the practice could lead to problems with other ballots. And one could believe that being out of state is a valid excuse but not wanting to show up to vote during the coronavirus pandemic isn’t.

National: Democratic election officials punch back on Trump mail voting claims | Joseph Marks/The Washington Post

Democratic election officials are punching back at President Trump's unfounded claims that voting by mail leads to widespread fraud. In a new digital ad, Democratic secretaries of state describe the president’s assault on mail voting as an effort to suppress minority votes and link it to a long history of racist voting requirements such as poll taxes. The video also attacks Trump and Republicans for other actions that make it harder to vote, such as voter ID laws and purging the files of people who haven’t voted in several elections. “White supremacy has no place in our elections and no place in our country,” the ad declares. It pledges Democratic secretaries of state will work to ensure voting by mail is an option for everyone during the coronavirus pandemic. The ad – released at the same time as a new website promoting Democratic secretary of state candidates – marks a significant rhetorical escalation from election officials who’ve spent much of the pandemic countering the president’s unfounded claims with facts and figures that show fraud rates from voting by mail are exceptionally low. It also underscores the stakes as election officials struggle to maintain public faith in the security and credibility of the 2020 elections while Trump continually undermines it.

Arkansas: Mail-in voting focus of suit filed in state | John Lynch/Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

The national battle over voting by mail opened a front in Little Rock on Tuesday when a retired Arkansas Court of Appeals judge and a former state elections director filed suit to force election officials to abide by a 35-year-old state Supreme Court ruling that greatly expanded the right to absentee balloting. Arkansas election authorities appear to have embraced a more restrictive standard for mail-in voting than the high court established in 1985, say Olly Neal Jr., the former judge, and Susan Inman, the former director, in their lawsuit that calls on Pulaski County Circuit Judge Wendell Griffen to order Secretary of State John Thurston to follow the Supreme Court holding in the November election. They are further asking the judge to bar Thurston from requiring voters to explain why they would want to vote by mail. No hearings have been scheduled.

Georgia: Election officials grilled over lines and problems in Georgia primary | Mark Niesse/The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

State representatives demanded improvements in Georgia’s elections Tuesday as they confronted Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger with questions about what went wrong. Raffensperger acknowledged that long lines in Georgia’s June 9 primary were “unacceptable” but downplayed problems with the state’s new voting system. He said most difficulties in the election occurred in Fulton County, which had some of the most extreme wait times.The state Capitol hearing, part of an investigation ordered by Republican House Speaker David Ralston, came as legislators are seeking ways to avoid a repeat of three-hour waits, precinct closures and equipment difficulties during a high-turnout presidential election in November. “It’s not going to work and it’s not going to be good enough for you to just keep saying it’s in Fulton County and not my issue,” said state Rep. Renitta Shannon, a Democrat from Decatur. “What specific policies are you going to put in place?” Raffensperger, a Republican, responded that election officials need to add voting locations, improve hands-on training and encourage early voting. He said he’s reaching out to community groups such as Rotary Clubs, Boy Scouts and sororities to ask whether they can host precincts.

Kansas: More Kansans are asking for mail ballots while officials work to make polling places pandemic-safe | Jim McLean/Shawnee Mission Post

Facing the prospect of standing in line at polling places amid the coronavirus pandemic, requests from Kansans for mail ballots continue to come in at a record clip. As of June 17, more than 142,000 Kansans had filed applications for advance ballots for the Aug. 4 primary. That far exceeds the 54,000 requested at the same point in the last presidential election year. Kansas Secretary of State Scott Schwab said the jump reflects worries about in-person voting, but he’s not willing to heed calls from state Democratic Party officials to switch to all-mail elections. That would create “massive voter confusion,” said Schwab, a Republican preparing to oversee his first statewide election. Five states — Colorado, Hawaii, Oregon, Utah and Washington — conduct all elections by mail. Other states may do so this year to prevent a surge in coronavirus cases. Kansas Democrats conducted their May 2 presidential primary entirely by mail. They considered it such a success that State Party Chair Vicki Hiatt said Schwab should use a similar process for this year’s primary and general elections rather than putting “a whole lot of money into making provisions for safety.”

Kentucky: State votes amid COVID-19, suppression claims as late voters are allowed into polling site | Phillip M. Bailey and Joe Sonka/Louisville Courier Journal

Kentuckians streamed into polling places across the state on Tuesday during a historic primary election that withstood a global pandemic and outside worries of voter suppression. When polls opened at 6 a.m., a line had formed at the lone voting location in Jefferson County — the cavernous Kentucky Exposition Center at the state fairgrounds. Those who showed up throughout the day described their experience as quick and easy, with most saying the traffic entering and leaving the parking lot was the most difficult task. Conflict erupted, though, when the Jefferson County Clerk's Office closed the doors at 6:03 p.m., just after the announced time for voting to cease throughout the state, leaving a crowd of about 50 people outside. About a dozen voters pounded on the glass doors and shouted, "Let us in!" The campaign of state Rep. Charles Booker, a Democratic U.S. Senate candidate, sought an injunction to allow the polling place to stay open until 9 p.m., according to a tweet from campaign manager Colin Lauderdale.

Louisiana: Lawsuits challenging Louisiana virus election plan dismissed | Melinda Deslatte/The Advocate

A federal judge has thrown out a lawsuit challenging Louisiana's emergency plan for its July presidential primary and August municipal elections, a plan written in response to the coronavirus outbreak. The emergency plan — crafted by Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin and approved by state lawmakers in April — increased early voting by six days and expanded mail-in balloting options for some people at higher risk to the virus. Two separate lawsuits filed in Baton Rouge federal court argued the plan didn't go far enough to protect people from the virus. U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick, of Baton Rouge, disagreed in a decision issued Monday that dismissed the consolidated lawsuits and upheld the plan. "The court rejects plaintiffs' contention that they are being 'forced to choose' between their health and voting," Dick wrote. The 13-day early voting period for the July 11 presidential primary is ongoing, running through July 4. Applications for mail-in ballots are due by July 7.

Maryland: Senate leaders call for ‘hybrid’ election in November, with mail ballots plus more in-person voting sites | Emily Opilo/Baltimore Sun

Two state Senate leaders have called for a “hybrid” election to be held in Maryland this fall that would expand the number of in-person voting locations and allow early voting, while still mailing ballots to registered voters across the state.

In a letter sent Tuesday to the state’s top election officials, Senate President Bill Ferguson and state Sen. Paul Pinsky urged election officials to act quickly to finalize plans for the November general election while keeping in mind the possible lingering health risks of the new coronavirus pandemic.

“Public health experts across the country agree that it is impossible to determine the effect of COVID-19 come November,” the pair of Democrats wrote. “Therefore, a ‘hybrid mail-in-preferred’ system is the best approach to maximize voter participation while minimizing public health risks.”

Nikki Charlson, deputy administrator for the State Board of Elections, said the board appreciated the “thoughtful” ideas of the Senate leaders.

“We are currently reviewing their suggestions, but we can report that work on some of the proposals has already begun. We look forward to providing the requested information and making changes as we prepare for the Nov. 3 election,” she said.

[Most read] Video shows Baltimore’s Ouzo Bay denying service to Black woman and her son because of his apparel; restaurant apologizes »
While the election is months away, election officials are awaiting a decision from Republican Gov. Larry Hogan on how the contest will be conducted. The June 2 primary was held after a delay of several months due to the virus and was conducted mostly by mail — Maryland’s first attempt at a statewide primary using that method.

Election officials previously asked Hogan to make a decision on the format for the Nov. 3 election by mid-June. The governor has since asked them for a report by July 3 on mistakes made in carrying out the primary.

In their letter, Ferguson and Pinsky, who chairs the Senate committee that oversees elections, said they expect election officials to improve communication with voters, advocacy groups and legislators in the fall, regardless of the election’s format.

The letter comes a week after a joint legislative hearing at which state elected officials expressed their exasperation over problems during the primary.

Election officials outlined problems with long lines at voting sites, ballots delivered fewer than two weeks before the primary and a printing error that resulted in thousands of ballots having to be manually copied onto forms that could be scanned properly. Election staff also apologized for removing Baltimore City election results from the state’s website on primary night without an explanation for hours.

In their letter, Ferguson and Pinsky said it’s imperative the State Board of Elections not repeat the mistakes, particularly because turnout in the November election is expected to be high.

In spite of the pandemic and the broad change in voting procedure for June, the state saw high levels of turnout, particularly in Baltimore, which had several hotly contested local races. The November election interest is expected to be even higher, as voters turn their attention to the presidential race which will decide whether Republican President Donald Trump remains in office.

Minnesota: Secretary of State says state will waive mail-in ballot witness requirement | Jessie Van Berke/Minneapolis Star Tribune

Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon's office said Tuesday that the state will waive the witness requirement for absentee ballots in the August primaries despite a federal judge's misgivings about a consent decree easing the rules for mail-in voting. Simon's office said he will follow a state court decision from a week ago that approved an agreement removing the witness requirement, a move that was sought in a lawsuit filed by the Minnesota Alliance for Retired Americans Educational Fund. Early voting in the August primary begins Friday. But in a separate case brought by the League of Women Voters of Minnesota, a federal judge said Tuesday that a similar agreement went "well beyond" the concerns raised by a voter who said her health could be jeopardized by having to meet the witness requirement to vote during the coronavirus pandemic. U.S. District Judge Eric Tostrud called for a more narrowly tailored agreement to remedy specific harms cited by the league's lawsuit. Despite Tostrud's opinion, Simon, a leading DFL proponent of mail-in voting, said his office will continue to waive the witness requirement in accordance with a decision signed last week by Ramsey County District Judge Sara Grewing.

Missouri: State Supreme Court sending absentee voting case back to Cole County Circuit Court | Brian Hauswirth/Missourinet

The Missouri Supreme Court issued a decision on Tuesday involving absentee voting, ruling that a lawsuit that aims to allow all Missourians to cast absentee ballots without notarization in 2020 can proceed. The Supreme Court is sending the case back to Cole County Circuit Judge Jon Beetem. The decision means the lawsuit from the NAACP of Missouri and the ACLU of Missouri can proceed. The circuit court dismissed the lawsuit, finding that the plaintiffs failed to state a claim on which relief could be granted. The Supreme Court reversed that decision, finding the plaintiffs had stated a claim and remanded the case to the circuit court so the parties can proceed. The organizations filed a lawsuit in mid-Missouri’s Cole County, challenging the constitutional validity of absentee voting legislation that was approved by the Missouri Legislature on the final day of session in May. Governor Mike Parson (R) signed the legislation from State Rep. Dan Shaul, R-Imperial, in June. It expands voting by mail through the rest of 2020. There are two but separate options under the bill.

New Mexico: Bill could allow for all-mail election in certain areas | Michael Gerstein/Santa Fe New Mexican

Emergency powers included in legislation Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham is expected to sign into law could allow for an all-mail general election in certain areas of the state with public health concerns from the pandemic, according to lawmakers and the Governor’s Office. Senate Bill 4, which the Legislature sent to Lujan Grisham’s desk Saturday night, was not intended to create a statewide, all-mail election. And a provision that would have allowed county clerks to send absentee ballots to all registered voters — not just those who made a formal request for one — was stripped from the bill in a Senate committee. But broad emergency powers in the bill provide a path for a range of measures, on a county-by-county basis, to protect public health. That could include shutting down polling locations in November, allowing drive-thru voting or requiring all-mail voting without an absentee ballot, according to the bill’s sponsors. “There is no plan [to do that] because we don’t know what’s going to happen,” said Sen. Daniel Ivey-Soto, D-Albuquerque, one of the sponsors. “Nothing is off the table,” Ivey-Soto added.

New York: Primary Plagued By Voting Issues, Including Long Lines, Broken Machines And Absentee Ballot Mix-Ups | CBS New York

Many New Yorkers say voting in the primary Tuesday was a nightmare. Some people never got their absentee ballots, and others were waiting in line for hours. The line to vote at Bronx Regional High School snaked around the block for most of the day Tuesday. “How long do you think you waited in line to vote?” CBS2’s Ali Bauman asked Shameeka France. “Oh, two hours, easy. I came here four times,” France said. “I waited inside because it was so hot out here and it’s been a long time. It’s been a long time to wait,” Renee Alford, of Morrisania, said. “I went walking in to find out and they told me there was only five people they were letting in at the time,” Kolaco Acquindo, of Morrisania, said. Acquindo called the Board of Elections to complain about the hold-up, and they eventually sent over an employee two hours before the polls closed. In the meantime, Acquindo says people who were waiting in line to vote got so frustrated they began to leave.

Virginia: Virginia Beach congressional primary election sees technical issue with electronic pollbooks | 13newsnow

On Tuesday morning, as Virginia Beach residents headed to local polling locations to vote for congressional primary candidates, some were met with paper provisional ballots instead of the option to vote on a computer. The City of Virginia Beach wanted voters to know it's not the voting computers that are the problem -- it's poll workers' check-in computers, called electronic pollbooks. Donna Patterson, the city's Voter Registrar, said offering paper provisional ballots was a "normal emergency plan." By 2:30 p.m., all electronic pollbooks at the 91 active precincts were working properly again, Patterson said. The provisional ballots will be counted, Patterson said, but not today. Virginia Beach's anticipated final voting results will be counted Wednesday, instead of Tuesday night. Virginia Beach spokeswoman Julie Hill said the Registrar's Office is investigating why this happened and why the issue wasn't caught ahead of the elections and will release a report with more details.

Malawi: Protect the vote, or the voter? In African elections, no easy choice. | Ryan Lenora Brown and Josephine Chinele/CSMonitor

The crowd gathered in Kasungu, stretched down its main street and bunched around a small stage. Some wore sky-blue skirts and dresses emblazoned with the face of Peter Mutharika, the country’s president. Others waved handkerchiefs or flyers stamped with four ears of corn – the logo of his political party, the Democratic Progressive Party. Shoulder to shoulder, they jostled for a view of his black SUV. As it parted the crowd, they cheered and ululated. Soon he was onstage, promising in a booming voice that his second term would bring a raft of good fortune to this town in central Malawi. It looks like a scene from another era, before social distancing made gatherings like this a near-impossibility in many parts of the world. But this rally was filmed in mid-June, as Malawi entered the final run-up to its election – held today. Across the world, the COVID-19 crisis has introduced a new wrinkle into the already complicated business of holding an election. Traditional campaigning, after all, is built on closeness – handshaking and posing for photos and the show of strength that is a mass rally. And voting itself often forces people to scrunch together in queues, touching the same polling-place door handles and touch screens and ink pads. How do you do that when experts say touch and breath could spread a deadly disease?

Singapore: Call to be aware of foreign interference risk during elections | Lim Yan Liang/The Straits Times

The Internet has made foreign interference in elections easy and inexpensive to carry out, and it will be foolish for Singapore not to take steps to deal with the threat, Law and Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam said yesterday. Whether it is cultivating political parties or sentiment amplification - such as using fake accounts to push a particular narrative - different methods of interfering in elections are "getting fused" together and employed by various entities, both governments and non-state actors, he added. "The Internet has turbocharged this kind of interference through fake news, through lies, through a variety of disinformation campaigns, through hacking," he noted. "Many things are happening, and you got to be on top of the game." Among the nations that said they have been targeted are advanced ones such as the US, Britain, France and Germany, he said. But there are ways to prepare for and counter foreign actors who try to interfere in elections or shape the voting behaviour of an electorate, said Mr Shanmugam.

Alabama: Want to vote absentee in Alabama? COVID-19 will be reason enough through end of year | Brian Lyman/Montgomery Advertiser

Voters concerned about the COVID-19 outbreak will be able to vote absentee in the Aug. 25 municipal elections and the November general election. The move does not affect any other of Alabama’s strict absentee voting requirements, but could significantly expand the number of people eligible to vote before Election Day. It comes after six weeks of rising coronavirus caseloads and a statewide mask order aimed at controlling the outbreak. “Amid coronavirus concerns, it is important to remember that Alabamians who are concerned about contracting or spreading an illness have the opportunity to avoid the polls on Election Day by casting an absentee ballot,” Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill said in a statement. The Secretary of State’s office said voters with COVID-19 concerns can mark a box citing a physical illness or infirmity preventing them from going to the polls when they apply for an absentee ballot. Voters could do the same in the July 14th runoff election. Rep. Tashina Morris, D-Montgomery, one of several Democratic legislators who has pushed for more voting options amid the pandemic, called the decision “a great move,” but said there needed to be additional voting options in the state.

National: Kentucky, New York Primaries Face Scrutiny After Complaints | Alexa Corse/Wall Street Journal

States holding primaries Tuesday are facing scrutiny after some voters raised concerns about delays in receiving absentee ballots in New York and voting-rights groups criticized a reduction in the number of in-person voting sites in Kentucky. The contests come after a string of chaotic voting days—including mail-voting snafus and long lines in Georgia and elsewhere—have raised concerns about the country’s preparedness to run a smooth election if the coronavirus pandemic continues through November. Kentucky and New York have presidential primaries on the ballot, along with some tightly contested Senate and House primaries, and they are dealing with challenges that contributed to voting problems in other states, including many more requests for absentee ballots than in previous elections and difficulty finding poll workers to staff in-person voting stations because of coronavirus fears. Virginia is also holding primaries Tuesday for U.S. Senate and House races, and North Carolina, South Carolina and Mississippi have primary runoff elections. In Louisville, Ky., voting-rights groups criticized the decision by officials in Jefferson County—the state’s most populous county with a large population of African-American voters—to open only one in-person polling location Tuesday, compared with the usual 231 voting sites.

National: ‘Nonsense’: Election experts reject Trump’s claim that foreign countries could counterfeit millions of mail-in ballots | Joey Garrison/USA Today

President Donald Trump delivered a new line of attack Monday in his crusade against expanded mail-in voting during the November election, warning that it could lead to "foreign countries" printing ballots to undermine results. Voting experts and election officials swiftly disputed the claim, characterizing the warning as a bogus conspiracy and pointing to safeguards that states use to protect the authenticity of absentee ballots and envelopes. Trump tweeted: “RIGGED 2020 ELECTION: MILLIONS OF MAIL-IN BALLOTS WILL BE PRINTED BY FOREIGN COUNTRIES, AND OTHERS. IT WILL BE THE SCANDAL OF OUR TIMES!” Trump echoed a claim that Attorney General Bill Barr made during an interview on Fox News on Sunday when he said vote-by-mail "absolutely opens the floodgates to fraud." Barr said: "Right now, a foreign country could print up tens of thousands of counterfeit ballots, and it'd be very hard for us to detect which was the right and which was the wrong ballot. So, I think it can – it can upset and undercut the confidence in the integrity of our elections." Lawrence Norden, director of the Election Reform Program for the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York School of Law, called the Trump administration's assertion "nonsense." "It doesn't make any sense as an attack against our election system," he said. "It would be too easy to catch. You just wouldn't be able to do it. There's obviously other ways – cyber warfare – of attacking election infrastructure. I think we have to be worried about them. But forging mail ballots is not a serious threat."

National: With unsubstantiated claim, Trump sows doubt on US election | Eric Tucker/Associated Press

President Donald Trump opened a new front Monday in his fight against mail-in voting, making unsubstantiated assertions that foreign countries will print up millions of bogus ballots to rig the results and create what he called the “scandal of our times.” The claims not only ignore safeguards that states have implemented to prevent against widespread fraud but they also risk undermining Americans’ faith in the election, spreading the very kind of disinformation U.S. authorities have warned foreign adversaries could exploit to foment doubt in the voting process. Trump accelerated his attacks following a bruising weekend for his reelection campaign, when a lower-than-expected turnout at a rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, left him seething, and as he fights for a second term during the worst unemployment since the Great Depression. The rhetoric, coming as states scramble to adjust voting processes because of the coronavirus pandemic, represents a two-track approach of trying to both block mail-in balloting in advance and setting the stage for challenging the results once it’s over. “It’s a way of trying to turn the foreign interference claims that have been made on their head,” said Richard Hasen, an election law expert at the University of California, Irvine. “Typically we’ve heard that the Russian government and others were working to help elect Trump, and here is Trump using fears of foreign interference as a way of bolstering his own side.” “This potentially lays the groundwork,” he added, “for him contesting election results.”

National: Trump spreads new lies about voter fraud, stoking fears of a ‘rigged election’ | Marshall Cohen/CNN

Reeling after a weekend campaign rally with lower-than-expected turnout, President Donald Trump changed the subject Monday morning with a series of widely debunked lies about alleged voter fraud in US elections, stoking fears of a "rigged election" this November. Trump tweeted an article highlighting Attorney General William Barr's recent comment that expanding mail-in voting "absolutely opens the floodgates to fraud." (This specific claim has been debunked many times.) Trump added his own commentary to the article, tweeting, "This will be the Election disaster of our time. Mail-In Ballots will lead to a RIGGED ELECTION!" Trump then tweeted an all-caps missive with many of the debunked claims he's been pushing all year: "RIGGED 2020 ELECTION: MILLIONS OF MAIL-IN BALLOTS WILL BE PRINTED BY FOREIGN COUNTRIES, AND OTHERS. IT WILL BE THE SCANDAL OF OUR TIMES!" In a third tweet Monday morning, Trump said "Because of MAIL-IN BALLOTS, 2020 will be the most RIGGED Election in our nations history - unless this stupidity is ended," and accused his political opponents of "using Covid in order to cheat by using Mail-Ins," without providing proof.

National: Election chaos renews focus on gutted Voting Rights Act | Bill Barrow/Associated Press

When some Georgia voters endured a pandemic, pouring rain and massive waits earlier this month to cast their ballot, President Donald Trump and other Republicans blamed local Democrats for presiding over chaos. “Make no mistake, the reduction in polling places is a result of a concerted effort by Democrats to push vote-by-mail at the expense of in-person voting,” said Justin Clark, the Trump campaign’s senior counsel. “Nothing more and nothing less.” But the meltdown was also a manifestation of a landmark Supreme Court case that gutted a key provision of the Voting Rights Act. The 2013 decision — Shelby County v. Holder — was heralded by conservatives at the time for invalidating a longstanding “preclearance” process that required certain states and jurisdictions with high minority populations and a history of discrimination to get federal approval for any changes to voting procedures. Seven years later, the fallout from that decision is colliding with unprecedented changes to the way elections are being conducted. In response to the coronavirus, many states are encouraging mail-in voting. That — combined with a reduction in poll workers — has prompted the consolidation of polling places.

National: Congress must act now to help states with vote-by-mail in November, experts say | Gopal Ratnam/Roll Call

The November presidential and congressional elections are a little more than four months away, and Congress must act now to help states prepare for a surge in Americans seeking to vote by mail because of pandemic-driven fears that are likely to keep them from voting in person, according to election experts, advocates and lawmakers. As many as 30 states have already lowered barriers for voters seeking to mail in their ballots because of COVID-19. Some, like Nevada, have gone as far as sending pre-printed mail-in ballots to all registered voters in some counties. But states scrambling to scale up voting by mail also need to be prepared for voters to show up in person at regular polling places because of glitches in the mailing process or a failure to receive mail-in ballots in advance. That could increase costs not only for new equipment but for staffing to handle both ways to vote, experts say. Several states that postponed their primaries from March to late May and early June saw voters turn to voting by mail in large numbers, said Edgardo Cortés, an election security adviser at the Brennan Center for Justice. “It doesn’t matter whether you encourage it or not, that’s what voters want,” he said about voters’ preference for mailed ballots. “So you have to be ready for it, and state officials need to be ready to handle that influx.”

National: Voter Fraud and Fake Ballots in Mail Elections, Explained | Mike Baker/The New York Times

As states grapple with how to safely carry out elections during a pandemic, President Trump has made an escalating series of fantastical — and false — accusations about the risks of embracing mail voting. Without evidence, the president has warned that mail elections would involve robbed mailboxes, forged signatures and illegally printed ballots. In a tweet on Monday, this one in all-caps, Mr. Trump warned of a “rigged 2020 election” and claimed: “Ballots will be printed by foreign countries, and others. It will be the scandal of our times!” That claim about foreign-made ballots was the latest misleading statement from Mr. Trump: He offered no evidence, and the tampering of ballots is widely seen as a nearly impossible scenario because they are printed on very specific stock and often have specific tracking systems like bar codes. Mr. Trump himself has voted by mail, yet at the same time he has claimed in the past that mail-in voting could mean “thousands of people sitting in somebody’s living room, signing ballots all over the place.” “Kids go and they raid the mailboxes and they hand them to people signing the ballots down at the end of the street,” Mr. Trump said in May. Officials in 11 of the 16 states that limit who can vote absentee have eased their election rules this spring to let anyone cast an absentee ballot in primary elections — and in some cases, in November as well.

National: Why You Can’t Just Vote on Your Phone During the Pandemic | Sue Halpern/The New Yorker

When Alex Howard, a resident of Washington, D.C., failed to receive an absentee ballot for the city’s June 2nd primary, he assumed that he would have to vote in person. Then, by chance, on the day of the election, he saw a Twitter post alerting voters of the option to vote remotely over the Internet. Howard, a digital-governance expert at Demand Progress, an advocacy group for good governance, decided to give it a try. “I’m a poker and a prodder and a professional evaluator of government I.T. programs,” he told me. “I like to see how things work.” He was directed to a Web site typically reserved for members of the military, which sent him to a site where he confirmed his date of birth and address. He then logged on to another site to vote. A few minutes later, he e-mailed his completed ballot to the Board of Elections. “There were people who stood in line for hours and hours to vote, and here I was, voting at home on my laptop,” he said. “It was really good for my family from a health standpoint, but whether it’s a good idea at scale—I don’t think so.” He is still waiting to hear if his ballot was received.

Editorials: How to fight election cyber attacks while protecting the health of voters during a pandemic | Quentin E. Hodgson and Jennifer Kavanagh/Baltimore Sun

State and local elections officials — nervously eyeing the fall for a potential second wave of COVID-19 — are scrambling. With only five months before the presidential election, they are scouting larger polling places to enable social distancing and planning to mail and scan more absentee and mail-in ballots than ever. But in addition to keeping poll workers and voters safe from viral transmission, there is a second major risk: how to keep the election itself secure from cyber threats. During the recent months of the pandemic, U.S. adversaries have stepped up both cyberattacks and disinformation campaigns. The United States should expect them to also take advantage of the logistical challenges of voting in a COVID-19 world to redouble their efforts against elections. Cyber threats to U.S. elections came into sharp relief in 2016, when Russia conducted operations to influence the electorate and infiltrate voting systems. In January 2017, the Department of Homeland Security declared elections to be “critical infrastructure” and embarked on an extensive cybersecurity support effort. It established, for example, the Elections Infrastructure Information Sharing and Analysis Center which provides elections officials with cybersecurity alerts, vulnerability assessments and response aid when experiencing a cyberattack.

Alabama: Attorney General seeks to block federal judge’s order allowing curbside voting, relaxing absentee ballot rules | Kent Faulk/AL.com

Alabama has asked a federal appeals court for an emergency stay of a federal judge’s order that allows local officials to offer curbside voting during the COVID-19 pandemic and relaxes restrictions on absentee ballots in three counties for the July 14 runoff election. U.S. District Judge Abdul K. Kallon ruled Monday night in favor of the plaintiffs in a lawsuit who claim several Alabama voting restrictions violate their voting rights because of hardships and risks created by the coronavirus pandemic. The Alabama Attorney General’s Office filed a notice of appeal to the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday and on Wednesday asked that court in an emergency motion to block implementation of Kallon’s order while they appeal. Kallon ruled that the potential health risks to older and medically vulnerable voters in going to the polls, or getting absentee ballots witnessed or notarized, merited the changes.

Georgia: Fulton County, State Chart Path Forward To Fix Election Issues | Stephen Fowler/Georgia Public Broadcasting

While politicians and the public are still seeking answers about what went wrong with Georgia’s June 9 primary, officials from the state’s most populous county are looking to ensure the same issues don’t plague the August runoff and November general election. In a private meeting Monday, members of the Fulton County Board of Elections, the Secretary of State’s office and several civil rights groups including the Rainbow PUSH Coalition discussed concerns with the mail-in absentee voting process, polling place shortages and struggles with poll worker training that led to problems with a new $104-million voting system. “The most important thing is, we really just want to deal with the issues that we’ve been seeing for a long, long time,” Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said to the board members. “Because even though we don’t run elections, at the end of the day we’re in the hot seat – and I’m sure you’re in the hot seat.” On Election Day, voters in parts of metro Atlanta – especially in predominantly Black communities – waited in lines upwards of four hours as county officials grappled with fewer machines in polling places, fewer places to vote and fewer knowledgeable poll workers because of the coronavirus pandemic. Fulton County accounted for about 70% of reported issues statewide, the Secretary of State’s Office said.