Former Federal Election Commission Head on Voting Rights

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: Tell me about how and where these signature issues are coming up, and how many ballots could be discarded because of that?

TREVOR POTTER, CAMPAIGN FINANCE AND ELECTION LAW EXPERT: Yes. There have been issues around the country, and the — I think the right way to frame it is to say, signatures are one of several ways to ensure the identity of the voter. Some states require signatures. Some states will require a birth date or the last four of a Social Security number or a home address. Some will require a variety of those. And so, the problem becomes, what happens if there’s a question about the signature? And we have represented plaintiffs around the country who have had issues. We had a plaintiff in North Dakota who has, unfortunately, M.S., and so, her signature does not look like the one on file. And so, there, we were saying to the state, you have to contact the voter and let them verify if you have a question about their signature, that it’s their ballot. In Pennsylvania, we sued the secretary of state because they had no policy about what to do if there was a question about the signature. And that’s an important case because it ended up with, I think, a significant victory for voters. The secretary of state said there was no provision in Pennsylvania law requiring that the signature match, if all the other identifying information was on the envelope, i.e., you can’t throw it out just because you have a question about the signature. And that was challenged in court by the Trump campaign. The secretary went to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, and they just ruled that she was correct, that Pennsylvania law does not require a signature match. It does not allow an election official to throw it out if the only issue is a question about a signature and the other verification is correct. And so, those are the sorts of issues that we’re facing around the country as we ensure that the, literally, today, 40 million Americans who are voting by mail have their valid ballots counted.