I believe USPS did not fully deliver mail ballots in Seminole County, FL

[Awsi Dooger]

Seminole County ballot return rate has been crawling every day. Only 23.2% returned, which is 8.4% lower than any other Florida county, and nearly 20% below the statewide average.

https://electproject.github.io/Early-Vote-2020G/FL.html

Among 67 counties it makes no sense that one would lag so far behind others. It's not as if Seminole has a monopoly on procrastinators.

I checked for evidence of similar in Seminole and found an online article regarding the recent Florida primary. It had all the evidence I was looking for. USPS did not deliver ballots. The election supervisor didn't know what happened. USPS promised it would be fine for the general. But obviously it is not. I have contacted FlaDems about this. But it needs greater exposure so more contacts can be made. Seminole County is in Central Florida, just northeast of Orlando. It includes Sanford. It is a swing county that voted almost identical to the statewide margin in 2016:

https://www.clickorlando.com/news/local/2020/09/29/some-primary-ballots-never-made-it-to-mailboxes-seminole-county-election-supervisor-says/

“We had an unusually high number of ballots, voters who were needing replacements,” Anderson said. “We noticed we were replacing more ballots than we usually do in a primary and that can be attributed to voters discarding them or quite simply the ballots may not have arrived in time for them from the Postal Service.”

Anderson said he doesn’t know why the ballots weren’t received, only that “somehow, someway” they weren’t.

“The Post Office assured me moving forward in the general election everything will be fine, that they’re going to work on what they need to work on to get better,” Anderson said.

[idziak4ever1234]

1. Stories lie this are disturbing to say the least.

[Awsi Dooger]

2. There may be examples elsewhere

I'm in Florida so obviously I'm looking at the trends in Florida.

This is not a tiny county. Over 126,000 mail ballots were requested.

[SheltieLover]

3. Call it in!

[JennyMominFL]

4. Seminole leans red

They only returned 62,000 votes by mail in 2016. This number doesn't really surprise me

[Awsi Dooger]

8. Trump carried Seminole by only 1.6% in 2016

48.7% to 47.1%

The mail ballot numbers are dramatically higher than 2016 across the state. That's why the comparison has to be to other counties, not to 2016.

As soon as the numbers were reported on that site, Seminole was lagging badly. And there has never been a one-day surge, typical of other counties. I knew something had to be unusual. The primary article confirmed it. That article is very recent, published September 29th.

[JennyMominFL]

13. Really?

I thought Seminole was more red than that. Well, That makes me happy. I am in Orange county, not far from UCF. Im happy to know that my neighbors just north are less red than i thought.

[ExciteBike66]

15. I'm in Winter Springs, waaaaay more Biden signs than we had Clinton signs in 2016...

In my blue-collar neighborhood, there are pretty much an equal number of Biden and trump signs...

[Awsi Dooger]

16. Also Seminole County bucked the statewide trend in 2018

Voted for Nelson and Gillum by roughly 2% apiece. You can hover above specific counties at map top right of this link to get the numbers from each county:

https://www.politico.com/election-results/2018/florida/#FL-gov

Seminole is on my Florida list of swing counties to keep an eye on. That's why I've been aware of this lagging absentee vote.

[Baitball Blogger]

5. Republicans in this county are notorious for cheating.

I handwalked my ballot to the election office. Still, I would like to go check on it after it gets tabulated, so I can be sure that they didn't switch the ballot. THAT's how much I trust this county.

[DUgosh]

6. Medina County Texas

Deliberately delaying mailing out ballots for register persons of the Democratic Party. Hubs and I both had to email, call, and appeal in person for ours - his finally arriving today. I believe if you don’t inquire they won’t send it.

[rockfordfile]

7. Chris Anderson is probably lying.

"somehow, someway". The right-winger before him was terrible.

[Awsi Dooger]

11. I don't doubt he's lying

With numbers this large it almost has to be systematic, and not a bunch of rogue mail carriers in the same county.

Right now we're talking about a deficit of 23,908 returned ballots, in terms of where Seminole should be if meeting the statewide average.

The bordering counties of similar size like Brevard, Lake and Volusia are right at the statewide norms. I checked all of that before posting this thread. Much larger bordering Orange County (Orlando) is at 35.3% return rate compared to Seminole's 23.2%.

[Dreampuff]

9. It does seem odd, doesn't it?

Have you thought about contacting as many of the investigative TV news teams in the area as you can? You could try WFLA since their team does a good job. I would start by contacting Shannon Behnkin from " Better call Behnkin". I don't see her do a lot of stories on political wrongs, but she could point you in the direction of someone else on their team.

[Awsi Dooger]

12. Thank you for the suggestions

I contacted FlaDems and also the author of the article I linked in the OP

[Boogiemack]

10. FBI needs to background check who is working for the USPS in certain areas. nt

[ExciteBike66]

14. I live in Seminole, my wife and I are waiting for the ballot boxes to become available, as we don't

fully trust our mail...

[Awsi Dooger]

17. I'm sure that's part of it

But that should be going on everywhere. Something is causing the unusual lag in Seminole.

I probably overstated USPS in the header. The more I think about it, the delay -- or absence -- is more likely to come from where the ballots originated, like the county elections department, and not USPS nonsense.

Could be some of both.

[ExciteBike66]

24. I can't claim to know anything about it, but my wife and I have always gotten our

ballots pretty much on the day we thought they would arrive.

One thing I will say is that we do know that our normal mail carrier is not a trump fan!

[MoonlitKnight]

18. Keep an eye on this

Let us know if you hear back from anyone.

[Awsi Dooger]

20. I will

Thank you

The nationwide mail ballot return rate in 2016 was 79.9%. If Seminole never approaches that level then something went wrong

[Sogo]

19. This might be a good contact:

https://bidenpresident.com/Contact

[Awsi Dooger]

22. Thank you

I submitted a full summary and three links

[Awsi Dooger]

21. There is good reason for GOP to suppress the vote in Seminole

Check out this recent article on the changes in the county since 2016:

https://www.clickorlando.com/news/local/2020/10/03/why-seminole-county-is-a-toss-up-in-novembers-election/

"No Democratic presidential candidate has won Seminole County since Harry Truman in 1948, but there’s real optimism among party officials that will change in November.

In 2016, President Trump defeated Hillary Clinton by 1.2% in the historically red county that’s part of the critically important I-4 corridor, when registered Republicans there outnumbered registered Democrats by more than 13,000 voters.

In just four years, though, that gap has significantly closed, with Democrats trailing Republicans by just 1,000 voters."

[Dreampuff]

25. If things don't improve

And you want to get the message out, the contact person in the Tampa Bay area is Mahsa Saeidi. That's probably an incorrect spelling, but she is the investigative reporter who is following the voting. WFLA

[Rice4VP]

23. Early voting starts on Monday. Put on 2

masks and some gloves and a face shield if you have one and keep it moving.

Florida Democrats never learn. In 2018 they stupidly created a ballot that was so confusing that a large percentage didn’t even vote in the governor’s race. Florida cheats but if Obama/Biden can win it TWICE, then so can Biden/Harris