I need to write this up. I just looked up my ballot status now and realized that its status is marked as "Pending - Not yet returned." I mailed my ballot over two weeks ago, on October 18th. How the fuck can it not be returned? International mail doesn't take that long to send.
I'm just really upset by this. I'm upset I only checked and found this out now. I know it wouldn't have made a difference but I also doubt that I'm the only one in this situation too. I don't even know how to correct this because I mean... I MAILED IT. If they haven't received it, what am I supposed to do?
This is also in a year where they changed the overseas ballot return rules in Pennsylvania to need to be received by election day, rather than postmarked before election day and received within a week in order to be counted. So at this point it's too late to correct even if my envelope did arrive.
This is also in a year where, for some reason, I got a federal write-in back-up ballot (FWAB) sent to me by my county election office (this is what you need to use if you never receive your ballot from your local election office) rather than a normal prepared ballot they normally send, and the FWAB return instructions directly contradicted the local ballot return instructions in multiple places, and when I tried to call my local office (internationally!) to get clarification, I was put on hold indefinitely with no indication if or when I would get through. I just ended up having to send it using my best guess, and in the end it didn't fucking matter because my ballot never arrived, I guess!
Like... I am just fucking sick of this. I guess I wish America a very have an actually functioning election system?? I'm tired of being disenfranchised by a thousand little cuts.
