LYNN — Some citizens are claiming that their votes were withheld or not counted during last Tuesday’s preliminary election. The city elections officer said she witnessed no such issues. A former mayoral candidate’s request for recount has been denied. So what really happened?
Lisa Pressman, president and co-founder of community-based organization Concerned Citizens of Lynn, voiced several major issues that she and other voters say they ran into: confusion about early voting and absentee ballots, people being asked for IDs at the polls, mail-in ballots allegedly found in the city post office after the election deadline, and a substantial number of blank ballots listed in the result.
Pressman said that, in her experience, these issues affected many people of color or low-income residents.
“It is not about one candidate,” said Pressman. “It is about people being able to vote. It is very lopsided. We just want a fair election.”
Pressman said she has encountered at least three people on Sept. 14 who were turned away from the polls without an ID. She said that this happened both at Harrington Elementary School and at Lynn Vocational Technical Institute; in at least one case, she had to walk in and explain that IDs were not required by law in Massachusetts, Pressman said
Several residents, including Pressman, said they received pictures of a bundle of mail-in ballots that were presumably sitting at the Lynn post office. Allegedly, the ballots were postmarked on Sept. 6 but didn’t make it to the City Hall before the end of election day.
“How many more are floating out there?” asked Pressman.
She added that she knows of a family of 10 who requested mail-in ballots on time and didn’t receive them by last Tuesday.
“This election needs to be voided and not certified,” said Pressman. “If it’s going to happen in the primary, it is going to happen in November.”
“All ballots in the Lynn Post Office on Sept. 14 were turned over to the local election board before polls closed on Election Day,” Steve Doherty, a spokesperson for United States Postal Service, said in an email. “We are aware of some ballots, postmarked Sept. 13 at a different facility, that arrived in Lynn on Wednesday, Sept. 15. We are further aware that an employee has shared photographs of ballots taken inside our facility.”
The email continued to say that the issue was addressed with the employee, and that the USPS would not be providing further comment at this time.
Elizabeth Figueroa, who was running for a city councilor position for Ward 2, tried to vote early with her 70-year-old mother and their 82-year-old friend. They were told at the City Hall that early voting was not allowed. Figueroa called the state and found out that individuals could still vote via absentee ballot until Sept. 14.
“I went back on the 13th and was able to vote,” said Figueroa. “My mom and her friend ended up voting on the 14th.”
On Sept. 8, after several people called the Secretary of the Commonwealth’s office about early voting confusion, Janet Rowe, Lynn’s city clerk and elections chief, sent an email to all of the candidates, saying that it was too late to vote by mail but voters could still request an absentee ballot. The same message was posted on Facebook in the City of Lynn Elections group.
The email also said, “We did not opt to have in-person early voting as the costs were not encumbered in our budget.”
In response to a recount petition from former mayoral candidate Michael Satterwhite, Rowe said that “no voter complaints were received by the city or state before, during, and after the election concerning access to the polls.”
“With COVID and all that extra stimulus money, we’ve got to make sure that we are conducting business in the city as usual in a safe manner; [it] should have been allocated, especially, to an election,” said Satterwhite, who was eliminated from contention during the preliminary election and had his request for a recount of mayoral ballots declined by the city.
Satterwhite, a School Committee member, said that he received a substantial number of calls from people complaining about the election process, including the situation with absentee ballots.
“I think the big issue we found with his election is a very technical wording, not understanding that not everybody is a legal expert or a legal scholar. Someone goes to City Hall and says they want an early vote, they mean ‘absentee vote’,” said Satterwhite.
“I also share the concern with voters,” he added. “We have to make sure that elections are accessible.”
The office of the Secretary of the Commonwealth only has the authority to investigate violations of election law by election officials, said spokesperson Debra O’Malley.
“’No early voting’ is not a violation; it is simply an option. The city chose not to have in-person early voting,” O’Malley said. “The City Council had the choice to vote to have in-person early voting; they didn’t do so.”
If a voter wants to vote absentee in person (if they qualify), that has to be arranged at the convenience of the local election official and they don’t have to allow walk-in voting, O’Malley said.
The Secretary’s office doesn’t have jurisdiction over the post office.
“We encourage people not to mail their ballots too close to the election. It does take up to seven days for mail delivery,” said O’Malley. “The postmark is not relevant; what’s relevant is when the ballots arrive.”
She advised using a dropbox instead, if the ballot needs to be mailed within seven days from election day. Voters can also check online if their ballot was received and, if it was not, go vote in person.
“If someone has a complaint of violation of election laws by other people, they can bring it to the attention of the law-enforcement agency such as the attorney general’s office or district attorney’s office,” said O’Malley.
