Maryland Board of Elections gets nearly 600K mail-in ballot requests ahead of primary

The State Board of Elections (SBE) announced nearly 600,000 voters have already requested a mail-in ballot for the upcoming presidential primary election, nearly the same amount of requested mail-in ballots from the 2022 general election.

SBE anticipates the demand for requests to exceed the 2022 general election and for the 2024 presidential primary election to be the highest mail-in ballot election in Maryland’s history in a non-COVID year.

Ballots for the primary election started to be sent to UOCAVA voters on March 27. Voters who requested their ballot be delivered via the web for them to print and return in their own envelope began to be delivered March 29. The vendor is producing ballot packets by county for voters who requested their ballot be mailed and many were sent March 29.  

The State Board of Elections had intended to send all mail-in ballots to voters on the same day for this election. However, staggered delivery dates per jurisdiction became necessary to ensure quality control. SBE’s vendor that sends the mail-in ballots by USPS to the voters experienced a delay in production related to ballot tracking.

Ballot tracking is a top priority of the state board to ensure the integrity and security of the mail-in ballot program.  This minor delay in the release of the mail-in ballots ensures that the USPS ballot tracking provided by the vendor is effective and accurate.

No mail-in ballots were sent to a voter without this tracking method. Mail-in ballots that were requested in advance will continue to be sent as produced by the vendor with an end date of no later than April 8.

Any requests for a mail-in ballot by a voter after the initial batch will be processed without any disruption to the normal business process and delivery schedule.  The deadline to request a mail-in ballot delivered by the U.S. Postal Service is May 7 and to be delivered by web is May 10. 

To request a mail-in ballot, go to http://vote.md.gov/NEEDBALLOT