COLUMBUS, Ohio — As of Thursday afternoon, 103,000 people have voted early. That compares to 2020 when 117,000 people voted early and there are still three days left to vote not counting today, according to the Franklin County Board of Elections.
Thousands of voters will not have their votes counted on election night because they voted provisionally.
A provisional ballot is used to record a vote if a voter's eligibility is in question and the voter would otherwise not be allowed to vote at their polling place.
Here’s why that happens and what that means for the official vote count.
In Ohio, a provisional ballot is rejected when:
- The voter is not registered
- The voter is not eligible to cast a ballot in their precinct
- The voter didn’t provide the required information
- The voter already voted
- The voter didn’t provide the required information within four days of the election
- The voter's information doesn’t match the information on the voter registration database
- The voter's date of birth is different
Provisional ballots aren’t automatically rejected or “soiled.” Each provisional ballot must be verified by a bipartisan ballot board. If a voter is able to provide correct information due to an administrative effort, the ballot is accepted and counted as part of the official count.
The provisional ballot process is required by the federal Help America Vote ACT of 2002. Provisional ballots are filled out in person at the Board of Elections or the polling location not by mail.
“The provisional ballot is a way for us to prevent someone from voting twice. There is a misnomer that provisional ballots are not counted or they are only counted in close races, that is not the case. Generally, about 90 percent of ballots ultimately are counted and added to the certified results,” said Aaron Sellers, spokesperson for the Franklin County Board of Elections.
Provisional ballots are already the subject of lawsuits including in the battleground state of Pennsylvania.
You can learn more about how provisional ballots are counted in Ohio here.