ORLANDO, Fla. – The November presidential election is a little over a month away but some Florida voters already have their ballots.
The Orange County Supervisor of Elections Office dropped off more than 110,000 vote-by-mail ballots at the United States Postal Service facility in Orlando on Wednesday for the first mailing of domestic vote-by-mail ballots of the November General Election.
“Orange County is now the fourth largest supervisor of elections office in the third largest state in the union. So, our decisions will impact the entire country,” said Elections Supervisor Glen Gilzean, who is urging voters who have already requested a vote-by-mail ballot to watch their mailboxes.
As of Wednesday, October 2, the Orange County Supervisor of Elections Office received 134,757 requests for vote-by-mail ballots for the election. The office will continue to mail out ballots over the next few weeks as more requests come into the office. The deadline to request a vote-by-mail ballot is Oct. 24 by 5 p.m.
[RESULTS 2024: Complete Coverage | What to know about the November presidential election in Florida]
Gilzean, who was appointed by Gov. DeSantis in March, has overseen five elections this year, with the goal of making voting as simple, safe and transparent as possible. That includes ballot design.
“What I did was to make it simple for our community,” Gilzean said. “I wanted to make sure that all of the candidate races are on the first page of the ballot and then followed by on the second page, what you will see is that all of the state constitutional amendments are on the back, and then the county has a number of amendments as we saw in the news, and that’s also right here listed. And then last but not least, the school board has their own referendum which is on the extreme back of the ballot. So, take your time, get your ballot in hand early enough so that you can read through the issues. Also what you will notice is that we have it in both English and in Spanish.”
The candidates and races on your ballot on your ballot depend on what area or district you live in, particularly for state and local races.
While overall requests for vote-by-mail ballots have increased in the last three months, the numbers are still well behind where they were for the General Election in 2022 (214,555).
According to the Florida Division of Elections, nearly 2.4 million people have received a vote-by-mail ballot so far, and 21,232 people have already turned their ballots in.
If you want to request a vote-by-mail ballot, you need to go to your county supervisor of elections website and request it online. You can also print out the state request form and mail it in, or call the elections office and put in a request.
You can find a list of the county elections offices in the state on the Florida Division of Elections website.
Be sure to sign the envelope that is required to mail the vote-by-mail ballot back to the elections office, and make sure it matches the signature the office has on file.
To turn the ballot in, voters can mail it, take it to the county elections office, or place it in a secure ballot intake station at any county early voting site once early voting begins on Oct. 21.
Gilzean also encourages voters to sign up for BallotTrax. BallotTrax is a free service that lets voters see the progress of their vote-by-mail ballot and get notified (via text or email) of the status of their vote-by-mail ballot, from when it’s printed to when it’s accepted. All counties have some form of ballot-tracking system.
All vote-by-mail ballots need to be in by 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 5.
To get answers to things like postage to mail a ballot back, curing errors or signature issues with your ballot, and what to do if you still have your ballot on Election Day, head to our Vote-by-Mail FAQ story.
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