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Study: Vote-By-Mail Doesn't Favor Either Party

By Nicholas Gerbis
Published: Tuesday, June 9, 2020 - 4:54pm
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In light of dangers posed by coronavirus, some have suggested vote-by-mail as an alternative to in-person polling.

But some policymakers argue mail ballots would give one party an advantage. 

A new study in the journal PNAS tests that notion.

To gauge the effects of sending a ballot to every registered voter while reducing in-person voting options, researchers looked at presidential, senatorial and gubernatorial general elections in California, Utah and Washington state between 1996 and 2018.

Comparing counties that adopted vote-by-mail to those that didn't, they found vote-by-mail slightly increased overall voter turnout but did not favor Democrats or Republicans in turnout or share of votes.

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