A month or so ago, former state House Majority Leader Dave Reed, R-Indiana, was approached by former Gov. Tom Ridge about co-chairing a bipartisan effort to ensure that all voters have safe and secure voting options this fall.
Reed, now a regional president of Indiana-based First Commonwealth Bank, accepted Ridge’s invitation and joined former U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy, D-Bucks County, in heading up VoteSafe PA, which is focused on two different matters as the fall election approaches.
One involves the polls where in-person voting will take place Nov. 3. The other involves ballots by mail.
“The General Assembly last year expanded mail-in ballot opportunities,” Reed said. “Also, counties are going to be focused on making sure that in-person voting precincts are going to be safe and secure from a public safety perspective.”
The latter could be a moving target.
“You don’t know how the pandemic is going to be playing out in different communities come Nov. 3,” Reed said. “There are hot spots now that could be different come this fall.”
VoteSafe is co-chaired nationally by Ridge, a former Republican governor of Pennsylvania who served as the first secretary of Homeland Security after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and former Democratic Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm.
“Ensuring that Americans can vote safely and securely amidst the pandemic is not a partisan issue,” Ridge is quoted on the VoteSafe website. “It’s good for Republicans, Democrats and everyone else. Let’s remember that voting isn’t a privilege, it’s a responsibility of citizenship. Responsibility also rests with government to make certain that every American has the right to vote safely during this public health crisis.”
Organizers said VoteSafe is committed to these principles: That all states and U.S. territories should ensure voters have accessible, secure mail-in ballots and safe, in-person voting sites; and that Congress should ensure that states have the resources they need to protect their voters and elections.
Or, as Reed posted on his Facebook page earlier this week, “This year’s election is too important for voters not to be confident casting their ballots!”
Reed said VoteSafe isn’t advocating policy, but rather is focused on making sure people know what’s available to them, as either mail-in voters or with plans to go to the polls.
“We have a better set of information now than we had in April, and we will have better information in a couple months from now,” he said.
He said the mail-in process, otherwise known as absentee voting, “has worked very well. The requirements to request an absentee ballot have always been fairly broad. The Legislature just sort of formalized that process.”
The VoteSafe website lists a variety of organizations that support the effort, from the League of Women Voters to Business For America, and from the public research organization R Street Institute to the grass-roots anti-corruption effort Represent Us.
