Governor Defends Decision To Allow In-Person Voting For General Election

He says there will be opportunities for mail-in voting, which he strongly encourages.

 

Annapolis, Md (KM) Governor Larry Hogan defended his decision  to allow in-person voting during the November elections.

At a news conference on Wednesday in Annapolis, Hogan said the mostly mail-in primary on June 2nd didn’t go as planned. “There were rampant problems, with thousands or tens of thousand either not receiving ballots, receiving ballots late, receiving ballots for the wrong districts, receiving ballots in the wrong language, or having to wait in hours-long lines at the handful of polling places that were open on election day,” he said.

In March, the Governor re-scheduled the 2020 Maryland Primary from April to June 2nd due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Noting that many poll workers are usually retired men and women who could contract and spread the virus, Governor ordered that ballots be mailed to every Marylander for the primary. A handful of polling places were open on primary election day to accommodate citizens who didn’t want to vote by mail.

Governor Hogan said he demanded a review by the State Board of Elections on why this primary was a disaster. But he says the Board couldn;t come up with an explanation, or  propose legislation or other measures  to make sure it didn’t happen again. So he took action “requiring the State Board to immediately mail an absentee ballot application to every single voter in the state to allow this election to be an all-of-the-above election with the most choices possible,”: says Hogan.

“And we’re encouraging everyone to vote by mail,” says Governor Hogan. “If you’re unable to vote by mail, by state law, we have eight days of early voting And we’re encouraging Marylanders to vote early in order to avoid any possible crowds by election day.”

The general election this year is November 3rd.

 

 

By Kevin McManus