Roughly one in five voters are expected to vote by mail in the 2024 election, according to recent polls, meaning millions of ballots will be in the hands of postal workers.
Is the U.S. Postal Service prepared to process and deliver that kind of volume in a timely manner?
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy believes so. "We're going to be in great shape for the election. I'm pretty confident about everything that were doing," he told The Associated Press in August.
And he's not alone. Election experts told McClatchy News that the Postal Service is well-equipped to handle mail-in votes. But they stressed that voters -- particularly those living in specific areas -- should take certain steps to ensure their ballots are counted.
"The USPS processes a total of 300 million pieces of mail each day," Charles Stewart, a professor of political science at MIT, who studies elections, told McClatchy News.
"The total number of mail ballots will be something in the neighborhood of 50 million which, of course, will generate a total of 100 million pieces of mail -- a volume that will be stretched out over several weeks," Stewart said. "Therefore, this is not a major surge in volume."
Kevin Kosar, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, who researches the USPS, agreed.
He told McClatchy News that the total amount of election mail "pales in comparison to what the Postal Service handles during the holiday shopping and greeting card season."
Further, election mail is considered a class above the rest and prioritized accordingly.
"Election mail is given a higher level of care, attention and effort by the Postal Service than first class mail," Kosar said. "It's going to get handled very expeditiously."
Additionally, the USPS's performance in the last presidential election should help assuage any concerns, Kosar said.
"Back in 2020, you had a postal workforce that was depleted due to Covid and nonetheless they delivered something like 99% or more of the ballots within the delivery window," he said.
Potential problem areas
But, while there aren't expected to be problems, there could be small pockets across the country that experience some delays, experts said.
"The immediate delays that we're concerned about are in the ones that are in the states impacted by Hurricane Helene and Milton," Kim Wyman, a senior fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Center, who researches elections, told McClatchy News.
Hurricane damage could have disrupted postal facilities and deliver routes in states like North Carolina and Florida, Wyman, a former secretary of state of Washington, said.
Voters in areas affected by the storms should contact local or state election officials to see if mail-in voting procedures have changed, she said.
Additionally, it's possible that delays could impact rural areas and communities near state lines, Wyman said.
Over the past few years, the USPS has consolidated processing facilities, meaning mail in these areas is "getting sent either across the entire state or possibly into another state to be processed ... which could impact travel times."
Bottom line
The bottom line is that voters should trust the USPS to deliver their ballots but should ensure they send them in a timely manner, experts said.
"Voters really need to be checking now with either their local election office or state election office to see if there's a cut-off time for applying for an absentee ballot and more importantly, when their absentee or mail-in ballot needs to be received by election officials," Wyman said.
These deadlines, which vary widely by state, can be found on the National Conference of State Legislatures' website.
When in doubt, a safe bet for voters is to mail their ballots at least one week before Election Day, experts said.
"If you haven't mailed your ballot back by a week before Election Day, you should consider delivering it to a drop box or otherwise delivering it yourself," Stewart said.
These drop boxes are secure, and pickups are done by local election officials, Wyman said.