The Envelope Please. Merrill’s Absentee Ballots Missing a Traditional Safeguard.

Absentee ballots sent to primary voters by Secretary of the State Denise Merrill’s will be different that those traditionally provided by town clerks. The upending of the local procedures due to the global pandemic has town clerks wondering how much Merrill knows about absentee ballot procedures.

Merrill, acting under an emergency declaration from Governor Ned Lamont, took over much of the absentee ballot process for the August 11th party primaries. Applications and ballots are printed and sent to voters by Merrill’s office. They are returned to town clerks where voters live.

One town clerk explained the unusual configuration of the Merrill return envelopes and ballots to local registrars of voters and ballot counters:

The return envelope for the ballots doesn’t have the voter’s name address or serial number like it is supposed to.  It is a blank envelope.  So the Town Clerks have to open the envelopes to identify the voters.  What you will be getting on primary day is the inner envelope only. 

Lamont, at Merrill’s urging, used his declaration to make absentee ballots more widely available than the state’s constitution permits. A 2014 statewide ballot question on an amendment to extend the use of absentee ballots was defeated with 52% of the vote.