Absentee Ballot Track, Receive, And Confirm Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. BRADY of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I urge the Members to support H.R. 2510, a bill to amend the Help America Vote Act. This bipartisan bill, sponsored by Representatives Susan Davis and Kevin McCarthy, and reported unanimously from the Committee on House Administration, will reimburse states for the cost of tracking and confirming absentee ballots.

More voters than ever cast their ballots by mail. Many remain anxious that their ballots may not reach election offices on time--they question whether their votes are actually counted.

H.R. 2510 provides incentives to states to develop systems allowing voters to track their ballots. Voters will be able to use the internet or a voter hotline to track whether the elections office has sent out a ballot, whether the completed ballot has arrived back at the registrar's office, whether the registrar has counted the ballot, and if not, why. Highly effective systems like these are already in place in counties in California, Washington, Virginia, Kansas and my home state of Pennsylvania.

Voters and election offices both benefit from ballot tracking technology. With voters able to track their ballots, transparency and voter confidence in America's election system will be greatly improved. Voters will be able to receive accurate and updated information on the status of their ballots and confirm whether they were counted.

Once this legislation is fully implemented, it will save costs for local governments and take the strain off election offices.

I urge all my colleagues to vote for this bipartisan legislation.

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