Maryland State Board of Elections reminds voters to use replacement ballot
An emergency meeting of the Maryland State Board of Elections (SBE) was held on Tuesday to discuss the aftermath of several mail-in-ballot missteps.
Election officials are urging voters to use the replacement ballots in the primary.
Last month, the SBE said a vendor error was the reason that voters received the wrong party ballot for the gubernatorial primary election.
Replacement ballots were sent to all voters who requested a mail-in ballot because the SBE did not know how many were impacted by the vendor's issue.
Early voting starts Thursday, June 11 and runs through June 18. Maryland's primary election is June 23.
"It's really tricky that they messed this up," a voter said.
What to do if you received a replacement ballot
According to the election board, if the voter returns a replacement ballot, it will be counted.
If only an original ballot was returned, it will be reviewed. If the ballot is confirmed and the vote is for the correct party, it will be counted.
If it's not the correct party ballot, then non-partisan contests will be duplicated onto a new ballot and counted. If there are no nonpartisan contests on the ballot, it will be rejected in total.
If both original and replacement ballots are returned, only the replacement will be counted.
"As long as they can get it right, but the important thing is just to make sure your vote is counted one time," a voter said.
According to the SBE's website, there is no risk of duplicate voting, stating that every return envelope/oath has a unique identifier to ensure that a voter can only vote one ballot.
Voters react to mail-in ballot issues
Maryland residents told CBS News Baltimore that the original mix up was a problem.
"I mean I'm glad that they acknowledged the error that they made and are trying to fix it," a voter said. "That's really important but also it really is just an unfortunate situation."
"I mean all I can say is I hope they get it figured out," another voter said.
