{"id":3936,"date":"2008-11-03T16:10:00","date_gmt":"2008-11-03T22:10:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2008\/11\/absentee-problem-may-be-less-severe-than-feared\/"},"modified":"2008-11-03T16:10:00","modified_gmt":"2008-11-03T22:10:00","slug":"absentee-problem-may-be-less-severe-than-feared","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2008\/11\/absentee-problem-may-be-less-severe-than-feared\/","title":{"rendered":"Absentee problem may be less severe than feared"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Statistics released today by the Do\u00f1a Ana County Bureau of Elections<\/a> indicate that, as of this morning, 633 people who requested absentee ballots had yet to vote, suggesting that problems here may not be as great as many had feared. <\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

A news release from the county said 7,908 absentee ballots were requested in Do\u00f1a<\/st1:placename> Ana<\/st1:placename> County<\/st1:placename><\/st1:place>. Before today\u2019s mail came in, 7,275 of those people had voted.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

That included 5,291 who had returned their absentee ballots and 1,984 who took advantage of the option to instead vote early because they hadn\u2019t yet received their absentee ballots.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Of the 633 who requested ballots but had not yet voted, the county expected that most would have their ballots arrive in the Bureau of Elections office today or Tuesday. Ballots could arrive in the mail or people could opt to hand-deliver them before the polls close on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Those who requested an absentee ballot but haven\u2019t received it at all or in time to return it can also vote in person today before 5 p.m. at the county clerk\u2019s office or on Tuesday at their polling place between 7 a.m. at 7 p.m. Voters living overseas can still vote if they haven\u2019t received their absentee ballot or didn\u2019t receive it in time to mail it back by calling the elections bureau at (575) 647-7428 and requesting that a ballot be sent to them via e-mail or fax.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

There has been widespread concern about absentee ballots in Do\u00f1a Ana County<\/a> since it was learned on Friday that the county hasn\u2019t complied with a law requiring that absentee ballots be mailed out within 24 hours of the office receiving requests for the ballots.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The severity of the problem wasn\u2019t clear until today. Some Republicans charged that 3,000 to 5,000 ballots weren\u2019t mailed out until Friday and that thousands of voters might be disenfranchised. The county maintained that those numbers were exaggerated and the problem was much less severe. The county worked, along with other groups, to emphasize alternative ways to vote for those who hadn\u2019t received their absentee ballots.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The only people who have no alternative method of voting if they haven\u2019t received their absentee ballots at all or in time to return them are people currently residing in other states but not stationed there for military reasons. That could include college students who are registered to vote at their parents\u2019 address in Do\u00f1a Ana County but attend school somewhere else in the United States and aren\u2019t present to vote in person in Do\u00f1a Ana County on Tuesday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Statistics released today by the Do\u00f1a Ana County Bureau of Elections indicate that, as of this morning, 633 people who requested absentee ballots had yet to vote, suggesting that problems here may not be as great as many had feared. A news release from the county said 7,908 absentee ballots were requested in Do\u00f1a Ana […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3936","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3936"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3936\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3936"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}