A key factor in that success was adaptability \u2013 of elected officials, election administrators and voters themselves. Officials knew they had to make changes so people could vote safely, and they had to find ways to protect the integrity of the process.<\/p>\n
Partisan politics played a role, too.<\/p>\n
Many Democrats\u00a0support a range of options for voting<\/a>, such as early in-person voting and voting by mail. Many Republicans\u00a0oppose these options<\/a>. President Donald Trump especially objected to mail voting, tweeting, \u201cMail boxes will be robbed<\/a>, ballots will be forged & even illegally printed out & fraudulently signed.\u201d Numerous GOP leaders followed his lead, though no fraud sufficient to change the election results\u00a0was ever found<\/a>.<\/p>\n Research my colleagues and I have conducted has found that when it came down to the people\u2019s choice, there was a clear outcome:\u00a0Alternatives to traditional in-person gathering<\/a>\u00a0at a polling place on Election Day are becoming more common, and more popular. Of the\u00a0158.4 million votes cast<\/a>\u00a0in the 2020 election according to the Federal Election Commission,\u00a0at least 101.2 million<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 64% of them \u2013 were cast by mail or by early in-person voting. A\u00a0similar trend is underway<\/a>\u00a0for the 2022 midterms.<\/p>\n Options for voting<\/strong><\/p>\n Even before the pandemic, most states offered one or more of what are sometimes called \u201cconvenience voting\u201d options \u2013 alternatives to showing up in person on the\u00a0Tuesday after the first Monday<\/a>\u00a0in November.<\/p>\n Early in-person voting<\/a>\u00a0lets someone come to a government office, school, shopping mall or other designated site and cast a ballot in the days or weeks before Election Day.<\/p>\n With\u00a0mail voting<\/a>, election officials use the U.S. mail to send ballots to voters, who fill out their ballots at home and either mail them back or drop them off at a designated location.<\/p>\n Before 2020,\u00a016 states<\/a>\u00a0required a voter to provide a specific reason, such as age or disability, to receive a ballot by mail. Twenty-nine states and the District of Columbia required no excuse. And the five states where elections were conducted by mail automatically sent a ballot to each registered voter.<\/p>\n Before the 2020 election and afterward, Trump and many of his allies questioned the integrity of mail voting. They filed court cases, called for recounts, and even conducted a partisan review of votes cast in Arizona, which was widely discredited.\u00a0Despite the news coverage devoted to their efforts<\/a>, little evidence of fraud in mail voting \u2013 or in any other type of voting \u2013 was uncovered. Even U.S. Attorney General William Barr, a Trump appointee, conceded there was insufficient evidence to cast doubt on the election outcome.<\/p>\n Instead of injecting fraud, mail ballots have made it easier for people to cast a ballot and play a role in charting the course of our nation\u2019s future.<\/p>\n States made changes<\/strong><\/p>\n Data my colleagues and I collected from states\u2019 websites and other sources shows\u00a016 states introduced new mail ballot policies<\/a>\u00a0in 2020. The result was that registered voters in nine states and the District of Columbia were automatically mailed a ballot. In 36 states, voters could successfully apply for a mail ballot without providing an excuse or listing COVID-19 as an excuse.<\/p>\n Voters in the remaining five states qualified for a mail ballot only if their application included a sanctioned excuse, such as out-of-town travel on Election Day, that did not include concerns about contracting COVID-19.<\/p>\n Our analysis found that partisanship played a role in which voters had which options. States with Democratic governors and Democratic-controlled legislatures were the most likely to adopt mail voting, followed by states where party control was divided. Republican-controlled states were the least likely to make changes. Indiana and three of the four conservative Southern states that continued to require a non-COVID excuse for a mail ballot were under Republican control. Louisiana, the other state maintaining an excuse requirement, had a Democratic governor and a GOP-controlled legislature.<\/p>\n How Americans voted<\/strong><\/p>\n State policies affected<\/a>\u00a0how people voted, we found.<\/p>\n Most voters<\/a>\u00a0in the 2020 election<\/a>\u00a0cast ballots in other ways<\/a>\u00a0than showing up on Election Day 2020.<\/p>\n Voters\u2019 familiarity with the options affected their choices. In the 25 states that had a history of no-excuse mail voting (excluding the five that switched to automatically mailing registered voters a ballot), voters were\u00a0about 22 percentage points more likely<\/a>\u00a0to use a mail ballot in 2020 than voters first given a no-excuse option that year.<\/p>\n And voters in these same 25 no-excuse states were almost 27 points more likely to vote by mail than voters in the five states that continued to require an excuse.<\/p>\n We also found that partisanship played a role in what methods people chose to vote. Democratic voters were\u00a013 points more likely<\/a>\u00a0to vote by mail than independents, and a whopping 26 points more likely to vote by mail than Republicans. GOP voters vastly preferred going to the polls on Election Day, and more of them voted early in-person than by mail.<\/p>\n In addition to selecting a president, the 2020 election made clear that many Americans \u2013 all across the nation and of all political stripes \u2013 prefer to cast their ballots by methods other than showing up on Election Day itself.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/voter-turnout-in-b-style-color-0a5c41-2020-b-was-higher-than-in-b-style-color-29a37a-2018-b-and-b-style-color-66ccaa-2016-b--1024x905.png\")
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