53.8  Ballot mailed.

1.  Upon receipt of an application for an absentee ballot and immediately after the absentee ballots are printed, the commissioner shall mail an absentee ballot to the applicant within twenty-four hours, except as otherwise provided in subsection 3. The absentee ballot shall be enclosed in an unsealed envelope bearing a serial number and affidavit. The absentee ballot and unsealed envelope shall be enclosed in or with a carrier envelope which bears the same serial number as the unsealed envelope. The absentee ballot, unsealed envelope, and carrier envelope shall be enclosed in a third envelope to be sent to the registered voter.

2.  If an application is received so late that it is unlikely that the absentee ballot can be returned in time to be counted on election day, the commissioner shall enclose with the absentee ballot a statement to that effect. The statement shall also point out that it is possible for the applicant or the applicant's designee to personally deliver the completed absentee ballot to the office of the commissioner at any time before the closing of the polls on election day.

3.  When an application for an absentee ballot is received by the commissioner of any county from a registered voter who is a patient in a hospital in that county or a resident of any facility in that county shown to be a health care facility by the list of licenses provided the commissioner under section 135C.29, the absentee ballot shall be delivered to the voter and returned to the commissioner in the manner prescribed by section 53.22. However, if the application is received more than ten calendar days before the election and the commissioner has not elected to mail absentee ballots to the applicant as provided under section 53.22, subsection 3, the commissioner shall mail to the applicant within twenty-four hours a letter in substantially the following form: 

Your application for an absentee ballot for the election to be held on . . . . . . has been received. This ballot will be personally delivered to you by a bipartisan team sometime during the ten days preceding the election. If you will not be at the address from which your application was sent during any or all of the ten-day period immediately preceding the election, contact this office and arrangements will be made to have your absentee ballot delivered at a time when you will be present at that address. 

Nothing in this subsection nor in section 53.22 shall be construed to prohibit a registered voter who is a hospital patient or resident of a health care facility, or who anticipates entering a hospital or health care facility before the date of a forthcoming election, from casting an absentee ballot in the manner prescribed by section 53.11.

Section History: Early form

  [SS15, § 1137-c, -d; C24, 27, 31, 35, 39, § 928, 930; C46, 50, 54, 58, 62, 66, 71, § 53.2, 53.4; C73, § 53.2; C75, 77, 79, 81, § 53.8]

Section History: Recent form

  83 Acts, ch 176, § 7; 84 Acts, ch 1291, § 12; 86 Acts, ch 1224, § 30; 94 Acts, ch 1169, §64

Internal References

  Referred to in § 49.63, 53.22, 53.49, 135C.29


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