By admin 
RALEIGH, N.C. (WNCN) — Mere hours before thousands of absentee ballots started going out in North Carolina, the State Board of Elections voted along party lines to change how counties handle problems when those ballots come back.
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The updated guidance, known as numbered memos, was not made publicly available until Friday morning. Some of the language mirrors several permanent rules that were delayed after people sent enough objection letters to trigger legislative review.
Democrats accused Republicans of working around the delay by incorporating some of the rules into the numbered memos.
“Legislative review has to have a meaning. Legislative review doesn’t mean just rubber-stamping it,” said Democratic SBOE member Siobhan Millen.
SBOE Secretary Stacy “Four” Eggers, a Republican, said that while both processes have a purpose, counties could not wait.
“We have several other things pending for rules that are not before us as numbered memos, because this is critical to provide this guidance and that the counties need it for this coming election,” he said.
Governor Josh Stein isn’t buying it, calling the move “a slap in the face to voters who stood up to these changes and a blatant circumvention of the law.”
The numbered memos provide binding guidance to counties about how to handle problems with returned absentee ballots.
One change concerns what happens if a voter forgets to seal the inner envelope. Before, counties could still process the ballot. Now, an unsealed inner envelope can trigger the spoil-and-reissue process, meaning the voter would have to complete a new ballot. There is an exception if the voter brings the ballot in and seals it in front of election officials.
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“Now what we have is a stricter interpretation, which is no, if you didn’t seal it inside, we’re going to spoil it and return it,” said Millen.
Millen said that creates an extra hurdle for voters to ensure their ballot gets counted.
“This does affect the voter. It may not affect you as you’re filling it out, but it affects whether your ballot counts. That’s huge. So, an effort to say this is just a process thing, I think, is incorrect,” she said.
A new ballot may also be required if the person returning the ballot is unauthorized to do so. If election officials have specific, firsthand information that an unauthorized person returned a ballot in person, the guidance tells counties to spoil it and issue the voter a new one.
“It’s a ballot security issue to make sure that the voter’s will and intent is being followed through,” said Eggers.
Under the updated numbered memo, photo ID deficiencies can generally be fixed, or cured, without requiring a new ballot. Election officials must notify the voter and give them until noon on the fifth business day after Election Day to submit the missing or corrected information.
Timing could get trickier closer to Election Day.
If a problem requiring a replacement ballot is discovered on or after the Saturday before Election Day, the guidance stipulates that election officials must notify voters that same day by phone or e-mail. At that point, there may not be enough time to mail a replacement ballot, meaning the voter may instead have to cast it in person.
In Wake County, officials said they sent out more than 7,000 ballots on Friday.
If you plan to vote by mail, election officials stress not to wait until the last minute, as there is no grace period. Ballots must be received by 7:30 p.m. on Election Day to count.
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