If you want to cast your vote by absentee,
but have not yet requested an absentee application, today is the last day you
can go by your county election commission and vote in person by absentee
ballot.
The deadline to cast your absentee ballot is
5 p.m. today. You can fill out both the absentee application and ballot in person.
If you already have a mail-in absentee ballot
and have not yet returned it, that ballot has to be in the hands of your county
election commission by 7 p.m. on Election Day.
If you have an absentee ballot but have not
filled it out, that does not mean that you can vote at your regular polling
place on Election Day. Your absentee ballot must be completed and returned to
your county registration office.
However, if you decide that you would prefer
to vote at your polling place on Election Day, your absentee ballot must be
brought back to the election commission blank. "If you want to vote at the
polling place you have to go to the county registration office, return that ballot
and they'll give you a letter to take to your polling place allowing you to
vote," said Chris Whitmire with the South Carolina State Election
Commission. "If you're going to do that, why not just return the ballot?
So really the best thing to do is if you have an absentee ballot get it back to
the county registration office."
State election
commission officials say so far a record number of absentee ballots have been
requested, and they expect the number of ballots returned to blow past the
records set in 2008.
In the last presidential election, a record
number 342,000 absentee ballots were cast in South Carolina, but state election
commission officials say this year more than 350,000 absentee ballots have
already been issued for this election. That number does not include in-person
absentee voting from over the weekend. "We've already issued more ballots than
were cast in '08 so we're already on track to break those 2008 records that
were set," said Whitmire. "And those [ballots] smashed the previous records
because prior to that, total absentee in any election didn't exceed around
150,000 [votes]."
If you plan to cast your ballot on Election
Day, officials say now is the time to double check your polling place. http://scvotes.org/ Polls will open at 7am and
will close at 7pm. Officials say if you're trying to avoid long lines on
Tuesday, the busiest times at the polls are usually from 7am-9am, 5pm-7pm and
there's a lunchtime rush.
You will need one of three forms of ID to
vote. Either your driver's license, your DMV issued ID or your voter
registration card. While the photo ID law recently passed, it does not go into
effect for this election.
