Tell Patch If You See Election Shenanigans In Baltimore

BALTIMORE, MD — The high-stakes 2020 presidential and general election is two months away, but voting is already underway in some parts of the country. The coronavirus pandemic is increasing interest in mail-in balloting — something about 100 million people are eligible to do without giving an “excuse” or reason.

Because of the surge in absentee balloting in Baltimore and elsewhere, the nonprofit investigative news organization ProPublica has launched its Electionland tip lines early this year. Patch has joined the coalition of newsrooms participating in the Electionland project to discover problems that prevent eligible voters from accessing or casting their ballots during or ahead of the Nov. 3 general election.

Patch participated in the Electionland project in the 2016 election, working with ProPublica to bring you information on vandalism at one polling place in Baltimore and a missing ballot page at another, broken scanners at the polls in New York, an election day shooting in Azusa, California, and more.

ProPublica wants to hear about any problems that may prevent people from voting — for example, mail ballot delivery problems, voting location changes, long lines, registration problems, purged voter rolls, broken machines and voter intimidation.

Our journalists and those at other newsrooms taking part in the Electionland project will do what we can to document and verify what readers tell us about voting and Election Day experiences. One of the most important parts of the Electionland project is to hear directly from voters. There are several ways to do that:

• SMS: Text the word VOTE, VOTA (for Spanish) or 投票 (for Chinese) to 81380 (standard text message rates apply).
• WhatsApp: Send the word VOTE, VOTA (for Spanish) or 投票 (for Chinese) to 850-909-8683.
• Facebook Messenger: Go to m.me/electionland.
• Submit the form below.