Westmoreland commissioners say no ballot curing allowed for November election

Westmoreland commissioners Wednesday said county voters will not be offered an opportunity to correct flaws that might cause their mail-in ballot to be disqualified.

Ballot curing — or the process that allows elections officials to contact voters to correct ballot errors such as missing dates and signatures — will not be implemented before the Nov. 5 presidential election.

A court ruling issued this week required Washington County to notify mail-in voters of potential ballot errors prior to Election Day and could impact all 67 Pennsylvania counties. But as of Wednesday, Westmoreland officials said the county will continue its hands-off approach with mail-in ballots.

“We will continue to follow the law, and I still stand by that whatever the law is from the state. If we interpret anything ourselves or create anything outside of the law, we will be left in a gray area and we will get sued,” Commissioner Sean Kertes said.

Kertes and Commissioner Doug Chew, both Republicans, have objected to ballot curing since a change in state law prior to the 2020 election that authorized the use of no-excuse mail-in balloting. They claim no direct language in state law allows for ballot curing, although some counties — including Allegheny — have allowed voters to correct potential disqualifying errors.

The issue has been subject to a number of legal challenges throughout the state, most recently in Washington County, where the Commonwealth Court ruled election officials must notify voters of potential ballot flaws prior to election day. That ruling is being appealed, and Westmoreland County — along with most other counties throughout Pennsylvania — have filed notice seeking to join the case in an effort for clarity in advance of the November election.

“The law is nebulous,” said Commissioner Ted Kopas, a Democrat who said he supports implementation of a ballot curing process. “Why wouldn’t we want to make sure every vote is counted? We want this decided quickly and have answers to this once and for all.”

Chew said ballot curing would be a burden for the county.

“We’d have to assess every one of the ballots that comes in and notify voters. It would put tremendous pressure on the election bureau,” Chew said.

Commissioners said Westmoreland County will comply if the Supreme Court rules that ballot curing is required.

Westmoreland County Election Board Director Greg McCloskey said his staff would be able to implement ballot curing procedures but suggested there is no guarantee every potential flaw can be identified by staff and that all voters can be notified and given an opportunity to make a correction before Election Day.

McCloskey said that had ballot curing been allowed in Westmoreland County in recent elections, it would have had minimal impact on results.

In 2022, 172 mail-in ballots of the nearly 24,000 cast were rejected for reasons that could have been fixed by a curing process. Another 210 mail-in ballots in the 2023 general election and 208 this spring were disqualified for issues that might have been corrected.

The county expects as many as 45,000 mail-in ballots to be cast in the upcoming election. As of Wednesday, about 39,800 applications for mail-in ballots were requested by Westmoreland voters, McCloskey said.

Voters will be able to receive mail-in ballots at the courthouse starting Oct. 7 and through the mail about a week later, he added.

Meanwhile, the county will begin testing its more than 900 computer touch-screen ballot marking devices and scanners that will be used at the 306 voting precincts. The weeklong testing will be held at the election warehouse on Vannear Avenue in Greensburg and is open to the public starting at 9 a.m. Monday, Sept. 30.

Rules to accommodate what could be a large turnout of observers were approved Wednesday by commissioners. Observers will be restricted to a roped-off area and are prohibited from interfering with the preparation and testing of the equipment. An election bureau employee will be available to answer questions.

No video recording or photographs will be permitted during the testing, McCloskey said.