Dates for ballots into mail set

(The Center Square) – Dates to go out are set for absentee-by-mail ballots in North Carolina, the State Board of Elections said late Friday.

Overseas voters will be sent their respective requests from all 100 counties on Sept. 20. All others will be mailed Sept. 24. The ballots were scheduled to go out Sept. 6, sixty days before Election Day.

The embattled state board lost litigation to send on the date scheduled. John F. Kennedy Jr., a presidential candidate, sued when the board refused to take his name off the ballot and eventually won at the state Supreme Court.

The federal Sept. 21 deadline – 45 days before the election – will be met, a release said. The law is in the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act.

The state board said more than 166,000 voters have requested absentee ballots through Thursday. This figures in more than 13,600 ballots for the military and those overseas.

Counties bear the costs of printing ballots. Population differences make for significant cost variance in the state’s 100 counties.

For example, a release says Caldwell County has incurred about $18,000 in extra costs due to the delay and court order; it’s $55,100 in Durham County; and $300,000 in Wake County, home to the state’s most registered voters.

Early in-person voting begins Oct. 17 and Election Day is Nov. 5. The voter registration deadline is Oct. 11, though same-day registration is available. Absentee ballots can be requested through Oct. 29.