No, a crease through a candidate’s name will not invalidate your ballot

Could submitting a ballot with folds through a candidate’s name invalidate your vote? That’s what a recent Facebook post said. 

On Oct. 22, a Facebook user in Wisconsin posted: "Ballots are not supposed to have fold lines or creases in the candidates name area. My clerk also told me that even in person paper ballots are susceptible to this rule where the fold lines would appear." 

The user said they reported the issue and their county clerk brought them a new absentee ballot. Another Facebook user reshared the post, saying, "Check your ballots! Folds, creases, and marks could invalidate your ballot. Be diligent."

However, voting specialists say that a crease through a candidate’s name would not invalidate a cast ballot.

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Mark Lindeman, the policy and strategy director for Verified Voting, a group that works with election officials and policymakers on voting and technology issues, said the post’s author shouldn’t worry.

"It's almost impossible to design a ballot where the folds wouldn't go through any ‘name areas,’ and it's also pointless: The scanners could not care less whether there is a fold through someone's name or party affiliation," Lindeman said. 

The Facebook post’s image of what looks like a creased ballot "documents no problem whatsoever," Lindeman said.

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A potential problem could arise if a "vote target," such as an oval the voter fills in to choose their candidate, has a crease through it. This scenario is more than just having a crease through the candidate’s name.

Lindeman said some New Hampshire ballots in a state House race were the subject of a hand recount in 2020 because of this issue, and the state subsequently passed bipartisan legislation to change the scanner settings so the problem wouldn’t happen again. 

Lindeman said ballot designers generally take special effort to make sure this doesn’t happen.

"Mail ballots are designed so that the folds won't go through vote targets," Lindeman said. Plus, he said, "modern scanners like those used in most of Wisconsin generally count ballots accurately no matter how they're folded. Good ballot design provides an extra measure of protection."

Lindeman said that, in most states, if a mail ballot can't be scanned for any reason, including problems related to a crease, election officials will either manually tally the ballot for inclusion in the totals, or create and scan a "remake" of the ballot which then is kept with the original. They do this rather than asking the voter to fix their ballot because at this point in the process, the ballot would be separated from any information about who cast it.

The Wisconsin Elections Commission didn’t respond to an inquiry for this article, but its Election Day Manual describes scenarios that could warrant a ballot "remake." Lindeman said a crease over the spot where the voter marks their choice could fool the machine into thinking the voter selected two choices; if that were to happen, the manual says, two election inspectors must work with the voter to replace the ballot with one that meets the requirements and reflects the voter’s intent.

Lindeman said the Facebook user may have misinterpreted the election worker’s decision to bring him a new ballot.

"It seems like this official literally went out of their way to reassure this voter by replacing a perfectly fine ballot," he said.

We rate the claim that "ballots are not supposed to have fold lines or creases in the candidates name area" or it could invalidate your vote False.