The Absent Bloc That Could Decide the U.S. Election

Election Day has already happened for the more than 80 million Americans who have cast their ballot via mail or early in-person voting this year, far surpassing 2016’s numbers. This surge has been prompted in part by the pandemic and apprehension about crowded polling stations on November 3, as well as concerns over the Trump administration’s efforts to hobble the U.S. Postal Service in the run-up to the vote (sparking worries that the service would not be able to handle a short-term surge).

For a small subset of people, though, these ostensibly new voting challenges—mail-in ballots, deadlines, and disparate state rules—aren’t new at all: Americans living overseas have had to contend with absentee-voter registration and mail-in deadlines long before the pandemic. Like their stateside counterparts, these Americans want to ensure that their vote is counted. And despite belonging to a group that has historically sat out elections,.