Bill to count mail-in votes separately

Automatic summary, not yet reviewed

1. The bill would change the electoral law so that ballots sent by mail go into a separate urn and are counted separately and independently from in-person ballots.
2. It would also require announcing the mail-in vote results out loud in a differentiated way, and recording them separately in the polling station's tally record.
3. The goal is to make it easier to detect possible fraud or manipulation of mail-in votes, which is now impossible because all ballots are mixed in the same urn.
4. The new rules would also apply to regional elections, and the law would take effect the day after its publication in the official state gazette.

Who it affects

• Polling boards (mesas electorales): They would have to keep mail-in ballots separate, count them apart, and announce their results in a differentiated way.
• People who vote by mail: Their mail-in ballots would be counted and reported separately from in-person ones.
• Parties and candidacies: They could see in the tally record how many votes each candidacy got by mail and how many in person.
• Spain's Autonomous Communities: The same rules would apply to their elections.

Words worth knowing

LOREG

Ley Orgánica 5/1985, on the General Electoral Regime: Spain's main law governing elections.

Escrutinio

The counting of ballots to determine the winner.

Mesa electoral

The team of people running each polling station: they check who may vote, guard the urns and count the ballots.

Ley orgánica

A type of Spanish law reserved for major matters, such as the electoral system, requiring stronger majorities to pass.

It summarizes the text as it was introduced. It is written by artificial intelligence and may contain mistakes: the official text is what counts. Read the official text · How we make summaries