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Panel advances narrow changes allowing emergency absentee applications when requested ballots never arrive
Summary
HB 1244, with two line-item substitute amendments, would allow voters who timely requested an absentee ballot but never received it to use existing emergency-absentee procedures if they later suffer a qualifying medical emergency; witnesses recounted cases where late or missing ballots nearly prevented voting.
Delegate Benita Anthony presented HB 1244 with two narrow substitute amendments intended to close a narrow gap in current law. The first amendment replaces an ambiguous phrase with a ten-day trigger aligned to mail-delivery timelines; the second clarifies that the voter must have applied for an absentee ballot by the deadline but that the ballot never arrived, and thereafter the voter experiences a qualifying emergency that prevents in-person voting.
Supporters including New Virginia Majority and disability-rights advocates described situations in which timely-requested ballots did not arrive and voters later became incapacitated, sometimes narrowly managing to vote by curbside or by other means. Gina Koch recounted assisting a terminally ill friend who insisted on voting, and witnesses said the bill would ensure similar voters are not disenfranchised by delivery failures.
Committee members asked about logistics and registrar burden; the patron said amendments align the bill with existing deadlines to limit administrative disruption. The subcommittee reported the bill 8–0.
