Service members will get their first reminder about registering to vote on Jan. 15, when a Defense Department message will go out to everyone with a dot.mil email address. The 2016 general election is almost a year away, but the primaries start in February, and the Federal Voting Assistance Program has been gearing up for months to fulfill its mission of helping voters vote. “I want to make it loud and clear: the Defense Department is ready for election season,” said Matt Boehmer, director of the Federal Voting Assistance Program. “We want to make sure everyone who wants to participate, can.”
The act of voting is between voters and their state election officials; the process doesn’t actually include the Defense Department, although the Military Postal Service Agency has a role in getting ballots to and from overseas.
But by law, DoD operates the Federal Voting Assistance Program to assist military and overseas voters in absentee voting. That group includes all military and family members, whether they’re living in the U.S. or overseas and are away from their home district on election day, and U.S. citizens who reside overseas fulltime.
Full Article: Beefed-up DoD voter education campaign to launch soon.