It’s strange to think that I will never again get up on Election Day and head to the polls. I’ll never again take my granddaughter with me to see me fill out my ballot and drop it into the ballot counter. I’ll never again grab two  “I Voted” stickers - one for her and one for me.

I’m voting absentee from now on, something I swore I’d never do.

Let me explain.

In January’s special election to fill the 7th District State Senate seat left vacant when Republican Jen Kiggans was elected to Congress, Democrat Aaron Rouse won by a razor-thin majority of 696 votes with 50.84% of the vote.

The district is split between part of Norfolk and part of Virginia Beach. Republican Kevin Adams won the Election Day contest and even the early voting.

But what clinched the election for Rouse were absentee ballots in Virginia Beach, traditionally a Republican stronghold. Of the 5,884 absentee ballots returned, 4,283 were for Rouse.

Here, look at the results:

To their credit, Republicans learned their lesson.

On the Kerry and Mike Show Tuesday Gov. Glenn Youngkin announced an energetic new push to have GOP voters embrace absentee ballots with the same gusto Democrats do — something many of us have been reluctant to embrace.

“Your vote matters and we're going to need engagement from everyone interested in moving Virginia forward to be successful. We can't go into Election Day down thousands of votes, so I'm thrilled to have such strong partners coming alongside us in this effort. We fundamentally believe Secure Your Vote Virginia is how, together, we can win in 2023 and beyond," Youngkin said.

He’s right!

Conservatives are late to this early voting party.

I like voting on Election Day, we say.

Election Day should be a national holiday, we declare.

Absentee ballots should be available only to the sick, infirm or those in the military, we gripe.

Sorry. Too late. Mail-in and early voting is here and it isn’t going away. 

Democrats figured that out in 2020. Looks like Virginia’s Republicans have finally joined them.

Absentee voters can take their absentee ballots to the polls on Election Day and swap them for ballots to vote in person.

( Not sure I see the point of that if the party is trying to bank early votes, but whatever. )

Former Congresswoman Thelma Drake recently penned an open letter to Republicans urging them to join her in signing up for permanent absentee ballots:

I am proposing that all Republican voters request permanent absentee ballots. Even if you prefer to vote in person, you can retain the automatically mailed ballot, bring it with you on election day, and exchange it for a standard ballot. The key takeaway here is if unforeseen circumstances arise, like an illness or unexpected travel, you can simply mail in your ballot. This ensures you have the ability to vote in every election. The process is trackable too; you're given a tracking number when you submit your absentee ballot.

 

While I appreciate that many Republicans prefer to vote in person on election day in keeping with American tradition, this limits our voting window to 13 hours, whereas Democrats have a 45-day early voting period, mail-in votes, and permanent absentee ballots at their disposal.

Yesterday Youngkin rolled out Secure Your Vote Virginia an ambitious new website that makes it easy for Virginia voters to request absentee ballots for the next election or for every election.

I went to the website, filed out a simple form and asked to be placed on the permanent  absentee ballot list.

Hey, I could die between the day I return my ballot in late September and Election Day on November 7th. 

If that happens, I want to do what Democrats have been doing for decades: Vote even after I’m dead.