USPS finalizes mail-in voter ballot rule that would give law enforcement voter-linked data

The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) finalized new rules for mail-in ballots in federal elections that would require states to give the postal service individual voters’ names and addresses together with unique barcodes assigned to their outbound and return ballot envelopes.

The rule would also create a new federal source of voter-linked data whose stated purposes include assisting law enforcement.

The rule was ordered by President Donald Trump in a March 31 executive order aimed at verifying citizenship and tightening federal oversight of mail voting.

Trump directed USPS to create uniform standards for federal ballot mail, require unique barcodes on ballot envelopes and establish state-specific lists linking mail voters to those identifiers.

The order says the system is intended to help ensure that only eligible citizens receive and cast federal ballots and directs the Postal Service to coordinate with its inspector general and the Justice Department in investigating suspected unlawful use of the mail involving election materials.

The rule has provoked a broader constitutional fight because it would use the Postal Service to impose federal conditions on how states administer mail voting, an area in which the Constitution gives the president no independent regulatory authority.

In June, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani ruled those key provisions of Trump’s order violated the constitutional separation of powers and the states’ authority over elections.

In an August 11 ruling blocking the USPS requirements nationwide, Talwani reiterated that “the executive branch has no authority to regulate elections.”

The rule has an August 21 effective date, but implementation remains blocked by litigation.

The Supreme Court on Monday stayed a separate injunction obtained by California and other states.

The August 11 nationwide preliminary injunction in League of Women Voters of Massachusetts v. Trump remains in place and bars USPS from implementing the mail ballot provisions for the November 3 election or any earlier federal election.

The USPS’ 95-page final rule, scheduled for publication in the Federal Register August 26, requires states using the mail for covered federal elections to enroll mail voters through a new Federal Ballot Mail Portal and provide USPS with each voter’s name, address, issuing state and two unique Intelligent Mail barcodes (IMbs).

USPS says the resulting information would give federal law enforcement a list identifying people states planned to send ballots to and the corresponding identifiers for those specific pieces of election mail.

“Currently, law enforcement lacks such information regarding the use of the mail,” USPS says in the rule.

The system would rely on the Intelligent Mail barcode, the 65-bar identifier USPS uses to sort mail and generate information about individual mail pieces as they pass through automated processing equipment.

Unique IMbs are already widely used for election mail. USPS guidance says uniquely serialized barcodes can facilitate tracking individual ballot mail to and from individual voters and allow election officials to know when and where a particular piece was processed.

Election officials currently maintain the relationship between a barcode’s serial number and the voter to whom it was assigned.

The final rule would make that relationship part of a standardized federal reporting requirement.

Both the outbound envelope sent by an election office and the return envelope provided to the voter would have to carry a unique IMb. Before an outbound ballot mailing is accepted, an authorized portal user would submit the voter’s name and address, issuing state and the barcodes for both envelopes.

Postal workers would scan outbound ballot envelopes and check the barcodes against the portal.

USPS says its verification process is limited to determining whether election officials complied with the portal’s data and mail piece requirements and that USPS itself will not determine a voter’s citizenship or eligibility.

That is narrower than the purpose described in Trump’s executive order, which says unique ballot envelope identifiers can help confirm that only citizens receive and cast ballots and directs federal agencies to use citizenship data and prioritize investigations of ballots issued to ineligible voters.

Return ballots would not undergo the same acceptance verification. But when a return envelope carrying its unique barcode passes through automated postal equipment, USPS systems can generate scan data associated with that identifier.

On or around Election Day, USPS would produce a state specific Mail-In and Absentee Participation List containing each enrolled voter’s name and address together with the outbound and return barcodes assigned to that person.

USPS describes the list as a form of manifest intended to help election officials and law enforcement identify potentially anomalous incidents that could warrant investigation.

The agency says it would give federal law enforcement greater visibility into who was supposed to receive a ballot through the mail and the barcode data associated with it.

The list would not establish that a person voted or returned a ballot, nor would it itself contain scan records showing a ballot envelope moving through the postal network.

USPS also says portal information supplied by election officials would not be matched with Department of Homeland Security databases, Social Security Administration records, National Change of Address data or other federal lists when the participation lists are created.

But the final rule discusses those records alongside USPS’s separately generated barcode scan data.

The agency says existing scan data for some ballot mail can have law enforcement value and that making barcode and reporting requirements uniform would “significantly improve the quality” of information available to investigators.

USPS has separately proposed a new Privacy Act System of Records to govern the portal.

The July 17 notice for USPS 820.225 Federal Ballot Mail says the system would be maintained at USPS headquarters and in a “supplier cloud computing environment.” One of its stated purposes is to determine adherence to federal law and facilitate law enforcement efforts.

Records would include voters’ names and addresses, the unique IMb numbers for their outbound and return ballot envelopes and the issuing state. They could be retrieved by name, address, state or barcode and would be retained for five years.

USPS says it will not begin collecting information through the portal until the new system of records takes effect.

USPS says it will not collect political party affiliation or inspect the contents of ballots and that access to the system would be restricted to personnel whose duties require it, transmissions would be encrypted and system access logged.

Article Topics

identity management  |  law enforcement  |  U.S. Government  |  USPS  |  voter identification