The 2024 general election doesn’t end until 8 p.m. on Nov. 5, but Alaskans who choose to vote by mail are already requesting their ballots from the Division of Elections. Absentee voting started Sept. 20, with over 9,000 ballots mailed to voters who requested them that month.
Alaskans can also vote in person starting on Monday at 8 a.m. in most communities in Alaska.
To vote absentee by mail, you must request an absentee ballot no later than Oct. 26. You can do so at this Division of Elections link.
For early voting, you can vote absentee-in-person in nearly any city clerk’s office in Alaska. In many locations, you can vote an early ballot.
If the election facility is operated by Division of Elections, such as in major towns and cities, your vote will be counted as an early vote and included on the Nov. 5 count, as long as your vote has been cast by Nov. 1. That allows election workers to double check to make sure people have not voted twice.
If the voting center is not connected with Division of Elections, your vote will be an absentee-in-person vote that will counted after the election, when again, election workers will ensure you only voted once. This helps maintain election integrity.
As illustrated above, the Alaska Republican Party has sent out a get-out-the-vote mailer to its voters in House districts around the state with instructions on how to vote early by mail or absentee. Many voters in Alaska move in and out of the state often and absentee voting is a convenience to them, since they may not be in state on Election Day.
Remember, the Alaska Division of Elections does not use drop boxes.
You must mail your ballot or take it to your regional office or any voting location. The ballot is 17” and will require two “forever stamps” ($1.46) to mail to the division.
In 2022, 267,047 Alaskans had their ballots counted in the November general election. 54,433 of those were absentee ballots and 37,562 were early ballots, for a total of 91,995. That’s over 34% of the vote being cast absentee or early in the 2022 election.
“For early voting, you can vote absentee-in-person in nearly any city clerk’s office in Alaska. In many locations, you can vote an early ballot.”
Thank you for this information. The Division of Elections website only shows Absentee voting when I look for how to vote early in person. Appreciate this!
There is a air of fear floating around that the elections will be shut down before people get to vote. Anyone remember the words “fear-mongering” and how little they help a situation? I am not sure why Trump is now saying to vote early. I do not agree with it. I will be voting on election day in person with ID. If the polls are shut down, maybe this will be the time for the military to step in and open the polls back up so that people can vote. Then, maybe it will be the time for all of us who have learned how to hand count paper ballots to put our skills to use and hand count paper ballots with the military guarding the polling places?