- There's a good chance that we won't know the winner of the presidential election on election night.

That would be a big change for many Americans who have become accustomed to going to bed with a pretty good idea of the victor.

We have to prepare for the very strong probability that an election unlike any other we have ever had might take a little longer to accurately count with integrity, said David Becker, executive director and founder of the Non-Partisan Center for Election Innovation and Research in a recent article for the Wall Street Journal.

He went on to say, more time being taken to report results is not an indication of a problem.

Because of concerns of exposure to the Corona virus an unprecedented number of citizens are choosing to vote by mail this year.

And mail-in ballots take longer to count.

Layered on top of that is the fact that some state laws prohibit the counting of mail-in ballots until election day.

This is a good reminder that in America that we were voting for national leaders.

We don't have national elections but thousands of local ones in which procedures are prescribed by state law than carried out by County officials.

In Texas, we have 254 counties utilizing a variety of balloting methods for machines to paper ballots.

The many recent reports of delays and learning election results made us curious.

So tonight we ask, when will we know?

I'm Becky Ferguson, and this is One Question.

(upbeat music) Election 2020.

When will we know?

That's this week's question.

This evening we will hear from the experts, county election officials from both Ector and Midland counties as well as party chairs from both counties.

We'll dig into mail-in ballot security, changes in voting this year, poll watchers, and how to make a plan for voting.

We'll learn how party officials work to identify their voters and then how they get out the vote.

But first this evening, we have Carolyn Graves, the Midland County Elections Administrator and Lisa Zertuche, the Ector County Elections Administrator.

Welcome ladies.

Thank you so much for coming in what I know is an enormously busy time for you all.

But thank you.

- Thank you.

- I wanted to start off this evening by talking about what is different about this year's election?

Can we start with you, Carolyn?

- Yes.

I think the main thing that's different this year is the pandemic and how it's changed the whole face of the election and of how we would organize and get everything ready.

From having to order PPE supplies, build the plexi screens, the hand sanitizers, wearing mask, and just trying to make sure that we have a safe election for both our workers and our voters.

- Are you finding y'all have had to make changes as well?

- We did.

Just like Midland County we even have Plexi shields for our clerks in between when the voter checks in.

We're just taking the same precautions.

- I think also this year the ballot is different in that we can no longer vote a straight ticket.

Is that correct?

- That is correct.

That was House Bill number 25 that said no straight ticket party affiliation.

So now the voter has to go through each contestant race and make sure that they select their party affiliation.

- What has the turnout been like so far this year?

- It's been really, really good.

We've been busy and we anticipate to stay busy.

- Is that the same in Ector County?

- Yes, it's been really, really busy.

First day of early voting we had lined a line outside of our building and it even curved.

So it was like that at three of our locations.

- We hear folks talking about how everyone should have a plan for voting.

What does that look like?

- The main thing I would suggest is to get a sample ballot, do your research, make your decisions and mark that ballot and bring it with you.

And then things will go much quicker.

But I do want to really stress you cannot bring it on your phone.

No phones are allowed in the polling location.

A piece of paper, the newspaper has printed all of the races that you can bring that and mark it but just be prepared.

- When you said that you'll know what you're doing when you get there.

- Yes.

- It's the same thing for Ector County.

Take your sample ballot, if you're not sure, like Carolyn said, do your homework, do your research and expect to wait in line as well.

- And you also have to have your voter ID.

- Your voter ID, yes.

- You have to have on a mask?

- We encourage everyone to wear one but it's not a mandated for the voter to have a mask on.

- What percentage of voters vote before election day versus on election day?

- For Ector County the percentage of early voting cast is usually equals to 1% give or take of election day.

It just depends on the election for that year in Ector County.

- Okay.

And you had told me.

- Yeah, we're about 50/50 from early voting to election day.

- We've heard a lot of talk recently about poll watchers.

So I think it's important that we talk about who can be a poll watcher, what you have to do to be a poll watcher, what the requirements are on the day of the election for watching the polls.

Do you mind starting us off, Carolyn?

- Yeah, a poll watcher has to be appointed by either a party, a candidate or a pack for a measure.

And there has to be a certificate that you can get from the secretary of state that has to be turned into the election judge when the poll watcher comes on premises.

There's a lot of requirements, like there can only be two at a location, they have to stay there a minimum of five hours without leaving.

Obviously not if they need to step out and make a call or whatever.

And they are just that.

They are watchers.

They can't interact with the voter.

They're there to see that there are no improprieties practices going on.

And if they see something that they have a question they need to address that to the election judge.

- But this isn't something that someone could just wake up election day and think I'm gonna go look around at the polls and see what's going on.

- No, not at all.

You have to have that certificate and again, appointed by either a party or a candidate or a pack for a measure.

- A minute ago you said folks should be sure that they have looked at a ballot ahead of time.

What are some of the ways that someone can get a ballot ahead of time so that they can be prepared?

- They can go to our website at the Ector County Elections Office and print out their ballot.

And we've even mailed out sample ballot to individuals that do not have access to a computer or a printer.

- How can we learn the election returns on election night?

I know we can watch television or listen to the radio but can we look at your website?

- We will print the unofficial results on our website.

Early voting results will be released at seven o'clock.

So those will be posted, like I said, unofficial.

And then as the boxes are coming in, they will be posted on there as well.

- Is that the same with you?

- That's the same practice that we have.

Early voting and the ballot by mail numbers will be posted first and then...

It's a little different because of vote centers.

You can't give up precinct numbers because they come in by locations and we are putting in some new practices to get those numbers out much quicker.

- Let's talk about mail-in ballots.

States have different rules for who is eligible to get a mail-in ballot.

Can you tell us in Texas who is eligible to have a mail-in ballot?

- Yes, in Texas, only someone that is over 65 years of age, has a disability, or is going to be out of the county and it must be mailed to an out of county address and you don't receive a ballot unless you ask for an application.

There are no random ballot by mails mailed out.

- So you have to request a ballot.

So you're sending something in a ballot application?

- Yes.

- And then after you send in your ballot application, then you will send a ballot and then someone completes that ballot.

How do they know that you've got it?

- Because once we receive the ballot we scan that serial number in into our system.

And once they're processed and we print the application that goes to that particular ballot, then we store them in our secure safe.

- And how do you determine that the ballot comes from the person that asked for it?

- Because we make sure that the signatures match.

- So you have a signature on the application and then you have a signature on the external envelope?

- That is correct.

- Talk a little bit about that because there's the ballot and there are several different envelopes that go with that.

I think it's important that people understand that this is a very secure way to vote.

- Yes, it is.

Once you receive your ballot you're gonna receive a lot of information regarding your mail ballot, not to give your ballot to anyone to go take it to the post office for you.

We recommend that the voter actually does the mailing or take it to the annex there with us.

And if that was to occur then they present their ID and we make sure that it's the voter who's turning in their ballot and they have a form to fill out.

- What if somebody is concerned that maybe their ballot didn't arrive.

Can they call and check with you all?

- Yes, they can call and check with us.

So they can actually, through the secretary of state's website, there is a tracking system, there's a code for each step of ballot by mail from when you request it to when it's mailed and then when it's received.

So they can if they want to, but we're always happy to look it up for them and let them know that yes, we've received it.

- And do you have the deposit box at the annex where somebody can deposit there or should they only mail it?

- We do have it.

The governor has said for this election only that anytime you can hand deliver your ballot by mail.

But the voter has to bring in their own ballot.

They have to bring in identification.

There's a form that they have to sign.

And we show what their identification was.

It also says who accepted that ballot and what date and time.

- When are the mail-in ballots and the early voting ballots counted?

- Not until election day morning.

The ballot board meets and they open them but then they're put in a secure box and sealed up and then the ballot board will meet election day morning and they will unlock that box and then the ballots will be run through our tabulator.

- And that's how you know at seven o'clock, what those numbers are?

- Yes.

- Yes.

- It's not even input in the system until seven o'clock.

- How do you make sure that an ineligible voter doesn't cast a ballot?

- When a voter goes to go vote and they check in and they don't find them in the system they call the office and we make sure that that voter is not there.

We look them up by date of birth, last name, first name, address.

If for some reason that voters not in the system, if they didn't meet the deadline for them to get registered, then we offer them a provisional ballot.

We don't turn a voter away.

We try to make sure that they're comfortable, that they understand and we go through all the process of the provisional.

- And then you get the provisional ballot and then how do you make sure that person really should have voted or maybe shouldn't have voted?

- For a provisional ballot you have six days after the election.

It's called to cure a ballot.

And that means to bring in your identification if you didn't have that with you.

One of the main reasons that we have is they'll say we went to DPS.

We get DPS electronically.

And so one of the things that they will open the portal to their system after the election where we can actually go in and we can look and see if they checked that box that says, do you want to register to vote?

Then their vote will count.

If they did not check it then their provisional ballot envelope will be used as an application to register them.

- I know you all get some ballots even after election day.

Are those counted?

Those mail-in ballots?

- The deadline is election day.

But about two years ago they changed where if we go to the post office the day after and if they are postmarked election day those count.

And then we have the, they're called FPCA, which is the Federal Post Card Application which that is for overseas civilians and the military, both foreign and domestic.

They have an additional six days to get their ballot in.

- So you'll have some ballots dribbling in after election day.

- Yes.

- Yes.

- That's why, as Lisa said, it's an unofficial final.

- Okay.

Now the question of the hour is when will we know the election returns?

- The returns, like I said, it'll be after the six days if there's any FPCAs.

And after the six days then we make sure that everything was accounted for and if there's anything else then it will be official after that.

- But the night of voting, when do you think you will have most of your returns in?

Or do you wanna venture a guess?

- Early voting will be released at seven.

We have 25 vote centers.

I'm hoping that by 10:00 PM everything will be in and counted for, like I said, unofficially.

- What are you thinking, Carolyn?

- It's so hard to know.

Because if they're in line at seven o'clock they get to vote.

And so if they're still voting at midnight then we're gonna be there.

- And you won't start counting votes until all the boxes are in?

- No, we will as the boxes come in, then yes, we will be counting those.

But we can't release even an unofficial final until each location has brought their results in.

- Thank you ladies both so much for coming.

Like I said, I know y'all are enormously busy and I wanna thank you for your time today and also for your service.

- Thank you.

- Really, really important.

- Thank you so much.

- Up next, a visit with party officials from Midland and Odessa.

(upbeat music) Along with county election administrators, county party officials share responsibilities for conducting this presidential election.

Here with us this evening are representatives of the Republican Party of Ector County chairman, Tisha Crow, and former Midland County Democratic Party chair, David Roson.

Welcome you tWo.

Thank you so much for taking time to come today.

- Thank you.

- A lot of folks may not realize both the parties are so heavily involved in the election.

Let's first talk about the election judges.

Who they are and how they get there.

David, will you start us off?

- Sure.

Typically we have people who've been very involved in the democratic party, who have voted in the democratic primary many times and who would like to be involved.

And this is a paid position being an election judge.

And we have people typically who are retired who would like a little extra income and who we feel we can count on.

- And then then if you have a Democratic judge then you would have a Republican co-judge.

- Co-judge, correct.

At the vote centers they're co-judges.

If you still vote in each precinct then it's gonna be an assistant judge.

But when they're at vote centers it's a co-judge.

/\ - So at every vote center there will be a judge and a co judge?

- Correct, yes.

- And so what are they doing?

What is the judge doing there?

- They're overseeing their clerks and making sure as people come in to vote that there aren't any issues with where they're getting their code, depending upon what type of machines it is, that everything runs smoothly, they're making sure paperwork's being done, updates are being done to any tallies that have to be of course posted on the exterior of the building.

There's a lot for an election judge to do 'cause there's a lot of paperwork.

- I understand the parties are also involved in something called the ballot board.

Can you explain what the ballot board is and what it does?

- Sure.

The ballot board initially when you first...

The very first start of this season you're gonna simply be opening ballots.

First what you do is compare that request.

So everyone if I'm 65 years of old age or I'm going to be out a town or I know I'm having surgery and going to be in the hospital.

Whatever the issue may be if I request and mail in ballot, then I'm going to have to sign something stating that I am who I am and I do need to vote by mail.

And when I send that in they will then send me whether it's a primary or general or both, depending upon how it's going, then they will send me my ballot and I will cast it.

I will then fold it, stick it in the envelope, sign the exterior envelope and mail it in.

When that comes into the ballot board we compare those two signatures, as you discussed earlier, that request and the back of the envelope.

That's the initial step of the ballot board.

It's an important step of the ballot board.

- Is the ballot board made up of party officials?

- Not party officials necessarily, but again people who said they would be willing to do it just as if they had been an election judge or alternate judge.

And so typically it is not the party chair 'cause the party chair has so much to oversee but it's usually an equal number of Democrats and Republicans.

- That are opening the mail in ballots?

- Yes.

- So it's a good check for everyone.

- It is.

- At the end of the day or at the end of election day how are the voting boxes secured and then delivered to the election headquarters?

And who does that?

- There are a number of seals that come with your equipment in the morning.

And literally at the end of the night after you've counted, you've made sure that all the numbers on your counters agree with what you think you've given out and all the numbers are right you use the seals to seal up the ballot boxes.

- And that would be the judge and the co-judge that would be doing that?

- Yes, in Midland we call that the judge and the alternate judge.

- Okay.

- Parties in the counties are just a hair different.

- Yes, yes.

- And so, yes, both of those people watch as they seal up, whether once it's here, you do it or here you do it, it doesn't matter because both are watching and everything is sealed up and it will not be unsealed until it gets to the election administration.

- In addition to your work on election day and coming up to the election you will also do a lot of identifying your own voters.

Can you talk a little bit about how you identify your voters and then how you get out the vote?

- We get out the vote in many different ways.

Today it's very different than it used to be with social media.

That's one thing that's come into play and that parties are starting to use more and more.

It's changed the face of politics a great deal.

It's interesting.

It makes it more fun in some ways and more challenging for those of us who aren't as good as social media but it is a way that we identify voters.

We find people that won't walk into a Republican headquarters offices that way.

People who are, they work very long hours possibly.

Maybe they spend a lot of time working out of town.

So when they're in town they just don't have the time to come by.

Social media has made it a lot easier for us to identify those people.

And we also identify and we do mail outs.

We try and in past years we've even had a get out the vote event with Midland.

Midland and Ector Republican parties have gotten together and held a press conference with different elected officials that represent us both, for example, Congressman Conaway and we've tried to just let people know how important it is that they cast their ballot.

- David, I think you your chair had told me that you all had been identifying voters for two years.

Can you tell me how you went about identifying them and then how you go about making sure they get to the polls?

- Sure.

There are publicly available lists of who voted in which primary.

And so that's where we start.

We have a list of who voted in the Democratic primary.

We also have a list of who voted in the Republican primary.

And I'm sorry but we don't wanna waste our time calling people who vote consistently in the Republican party.

We wanna get out our voters.

So we call, we text, we email voters as we can, we ask them who we've identified to speak to their family and make sure their family and friends, if they're interested in voting Democratic, that they get out and make a plan to vote.

- What does that mean when you talk about make a plan to vote?

- I don't know if you've been around town on the opening day of elections, Becky, but there's long lines in the polling places.

And you may not have the time or energy to stand in line for 45 minutes or an hour and a half.

And so if you might think, I'm gonna vote on election day.

It's only gonna be longer then.

Happily, this year we have almost three full weeks of early voting.

And so if you think you wanna vote on the second or third or fifth day of early voting that might be a good plan because the big crush usually will be at the beginning.

So you think about what time of day you wanna go.

Make sure that if you're going at a lunch hour or dinner hour you're prepared with a snack in case it's gonna be a long line.

- After you have urged somebody to vote how do you follow up to make sure they actually do it?

- In past years we've had some candidates who actually come in and sit in headquarters and phone bank and call.

If they have specific lists that they've worked on in particular we send text messages often.

That's one of the things that we prefer to do in Ector County as we use the text messaging a lot.

We don't do as much of email.

We can, but that's not something that we typically do near so much.

We rely a lot on phones, word of mouth, social media, we do a lot of the texting as well.

Just a reminder, we know you said you were gonna get out and vote because everyday you can get a list of those who have voted.

- And so you can follow up.

- Absolutely.

You can clarify and make sure, I know they planned to get out and they haven't done so so we need to give them a gentle reminder.

- A gentle reminder.

- Thank you all so much for coming in.

I know this is a busy time for you all as well and thank you for your dedicated service.

Up next, art matters.

(upbeat music) - Our painting this evening entitled New Synthesis Number 26 is an acrylic on canvas by Jack Roth, 1927 to 2004.

Roth was an American painter who developed a style as an abstract expressionists and as a color field painter.

He studied with among others, Mark Rothko.

He exhibited his paintings in the Guggenheim Museum and the Museum of Modern Art where several of his works are in permanent collection.

The painting comes to us from Baker Shore Fine Art Gallery here in Midland.

There is still time to vote early through this Friday.

The general election is a week from tomorrow, Tuesday, November, 3rd.

You can get access to sample ballots along with your polling places by going to our website, basinpbs.org.

Each week we pose a question.

This week, election 2020, when will we know?

And we brought in experts to help us find answers.

We've learned a lot about ballot security and the meticulous and conscientious manner in which local officials are conducting this election and how they'll tally the votes.

But answering this week's question definitively is tricky.

In the age of COVID we can't answer the question of when we'll know with confidence.

We could learn final results election night but it could take quite a bit longer.

There are so many unknowns.

So the watch word this election is patience while we wait for all of our votes to be counted.

Finally, thank you for watching One Question.

We'll be back each Monday at five following Basin Life where we will answer the questions you want to know from the people who know.

If you have a question, send it to us at One Question at basinpbs.org.

Next week, is this a good time to buy?

A look at incredibly low mortgage interest rates and the local real estate market.

Up next, BBC world news America with Katty Kay.

I'm Becky Ferguson.

Good night.

(upbeat music)