Mail-in Ballots for All? My Story Shows Why We Need Common-Sense Reform

I understand firsthand why so many Americans are concerned about California’s “mail ballots for all” approach. My story isn’t political, it’s personal.

When I married my wife 18 years ago, she came to the United States legally from Indonesia on a green card with my beautiful daughter holding a USA Passport. She perfected her English, worked hard, paid taxes, and eventually earned a California driver’s license. Like many new residents, we assumed that having a state-issued license meant she could participate fully in civic life. So when the Department of Motor Vehicles offered her voter registration paperwork, she mistakenly completed it, believing it was appropriate at the time.

It wasn’t until after the election of, I remember it well, the year Barack Obama was elected president for a second term, that we realized the mistake. Green card holders are lawful permanent residents, not U.S. citizens, and therefore are not eligible to vote. My wife has never voted again since that election.

Since then, I’ve tried repeatedly to correct the error and remove her from the Nevada County voter rolls. I’ve called, written, and even visited the county elections office. Yet here we are, all these years later, and I still receive a mail-in ballot addressed to her every election cycle including this special election for November 2025.

If this can happen to us, with a clear paper trail, a marriage license, and with a decade  plus of residency, how many other green card holders or ineligible residents are still on the voter rolls today? How many are receiving ballots, not out of fraud, but out of a broken system that confuses eligibility and convenience?

This experience opened my eyes to a much larger problem in California’s elections: a system that prioritizes ease over integrity.

In 2018, California launched its “Motor Voter” law, automatically registering DMV customers to vote unless they actively opted out. The goal was to make registration easier and convenient. But the execution was sloppy. If you can believe this; that same year, the state admitted to only about 23,000 erroneous registrations, and only roughly 1,500 of those involved non-citizens who were wrongly added to the rolls. Officials insisted that very few of those people actually voted. But the point isn’t how many, the point is that it happened at all.

When a non-citizen gets a ballot in the mail, it doesn’t just risk an illegal vote. It also undermines public confidence that every legal vote counts equally.

Now, California has taken that same attitude, “make it easy for everyone” and extended it to the entire voting process. Every active voter, regardless of how they registered or verified their citizenship, is mailed a ballot automatically, weeks before Election Day.

Supporters say this expands access. I say it expands the potential for error

Mailing ballots a month before an election creates an enormous logistical window for mistakes, misdeliveries, or manipulation. Addresses change, people move or pass away, and the longer ballots are circulating, the harder it is to track them securely. Election officials do heroic work, but even the best systems can’t control what happens to tens of millions of loose ballots floating around for weeks on end.

This isn’t a partisan concern. It’s a practical one

Voting by mail absolutely has its place. Seniors, disabled voters, and members of the military rely on it, and they should. We should make sure those groups always have access. But turning mail-in ballots into the default method for everyone creates more risk than reward.

Most Americans, like me, believe that showing up in person on Election Day, with valid ID, proof of actual address and citizenship, should remain the standard. That’s not voter suppression. That’s voter verification. It’s the same standard used in most democracies around the world, including Canada, France, and India. If they can require identification to protect their elections, why can’t we?

Here’s what California could do instead

●     Mail ballots only to verified, up-to-date addresses and no earlier than two weeks before Election Day. Sending them earlier invites confusion, lost ballots, and potential misuse, with exceptions for active-duty military overseas.

●     Require active in person registration rather than automatic enrollment. Voters should affirm their citizenship and address directly, not passively through DMV.

●     Regularly clean voter rolls through a transparent process to remove duplicates, deceased voters, and ineligible registrants certified every four years.

●     Make Election Day a civic event again, encouraging in-person participation in one of the few rituals that still unites citizens.

●     Condense in-person voting to the Saturday before through Election Day Tuesday. Instead of stretching voting over nearly a month, a focused four-day window would continue participation and accessible for working Americans while maintaining oversight, efficiency, and election integrity.

●     Ensure homeless individuals can vote in person from Saturday through Election Day Tuesday, with eligibility verified through the county health department or designated homeless service centers. These agencies should also help unhoused residents confirm citizenship and obtain voter identification if needed, ensuring every eligible voter can participate with integrity and dignity without fraud.

These are not radical changes. They are common-sense updates that would make California’s and National elections more accurate, more trustworthy, and ultimately more respected.

Right now, the system treats everyone as though convenience is the only value that matters. But in a republic, trust is just as important as access. Every time a ballot goes to someone who shouldn’t be registered or when election results take weeks to verify, that trust erodes a little more.

I’m proud that my now ex-wife has followed the rules, respected our laws, and refrained from voting since that first election on her arrival. But I still received that ballot. And until she stops getting it, I can’t honestly say our voter rolls are clean or that our election system is truly secure.

California can lead the nation in many ways. Let’s make sure election integrity is one of them.