What is an absentee ballot?
Not all voters can get to the polling place on election day. An absentee ballot is the printed ballot marked by an absent voter, sealed in a special envelope, and given or mailed to the municipal clerk. The municipal clerk ensures that each absentee ballot that is returned in a timely manner gets to the right polling place on election day. If accepted, the absentee ballot is counted as if the voter had cast the ballot in person.
The right to vote in a free and open election is considered a sacred privilege in democratic countries. In order to certify the results and reduce the chance of election fraud, trained poll workers must verify that a registered voter appeared in person at a designated voting area and filled out an official ballot. But what happens when a registered voter cannot physically appear at his or her designated polling place? One solution is a legal proxy known as the absentee ballot. An absentee ballot generally contains the same information as a regular ballot, from candidates’ names to descriptions of the issues. The only difference is that absentee ballots are mailed directly to voters who request them before the actual voting day. Every country and state has different qualifications for receiving an absentee ballot, but there are some general similarities. Voters must be officially registered before they can request an absentee ballot. This means an unregistered American voter cannot requ
