2023 Senate Bill 369

House Fiscal Agency Analysis

The bill would amend Michigan Election law to do the following: -- Allow any registered elector to become a permanent mail ballot voter by filling out a single absent voter application to receive absent voter ballots for every future election. -- Prescribe the reasons for which an absent voter application for all future elections could be rescinded by the Secretary of State (SOS) or appropriate city or township clerk. -- Require each city and township clerk to maintain and track permanent mail ballot voters. -- Require the SOS to issue instructions to clerks regarding the discontinuation of any permanent absent voter ballot application list. -- Require a city or township clerk or the SOS to notify an elector, upon the elector’s change of address, that any prior permanent voter ballot application submitted by the elector would be rescinded and the elector would not be sent an absent voter ballot unless the elector submitted a new absent voter ballot application. -- Require the SOS to prescribe the presidential primary ballot selection form and make the form available in person, by mail, and online. -- Require each city and township clerk to mail a presidential primary ballot selection form to all permanent mail ballot voters in a city or township who had not made a ballot selection for the presidential primary election at least 60 days before the election. -- Require a clerk to notify a permanent mail ballot voter of the time frame to return the ballot to receive a presidential primary election ballot if the elector had not returned the ballot selection form by the fortieth day before a presidential primary election. -- Modify the period after an election that returns would have to be preserved from two years to 22 months. -- Allow ballots containing a Federal office and all presidential primary ballot selection forms to be destroyed after 22 months.