She recently announced her department will be sending out unsolicited absentee ballot applications to 7.7 million registered voters in Michigan.
In the past, opponents have been successful before Michigan courts stopping mass mailings of absentee ballot applications.
In Fleming, the court ruled unconstitutional the Macomb County Clerk’s mass mailing of absentee ballot applications.
The case relied on the following facts: the applications discriminated in favor of a narrow portion of voters, they were limited to persons over 60-years of age; the applications were sent out by a county clerk; and it violated Art. 2, Section 4 of the Michigan Constitution.
This time around a different legal outcome is more likely; because the mass mailing of absentee ballot applications is being done by a current Secretary of State, Michigan’s principal elections official, not a local county clerk.
