Bilingual Voting Officials Assigned to 25 Sites; Language Access Resources Available at All Sites and on Election Day
Early Voting in all of Chicago’s 50 Wards started today, Monday, March 4 and will be open through Monday, March 18. These sites are open Weekdays from 9:00am to 6pm; Saturdays from 9:00am to 5:00pm; and Sundays from 10:00am to 4:00pm. All Ward Early Voting locations and the Supersite will also be open as Vote Centers on Election Day, Tuesday, March 19, from 6:00am to 7:00pm.
Any voter living in Chicago can vote at any of these sites, no matter where they live in the city. All Early Voting sites are fully compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
Currently, nearly 2,700 voters have Early Voted for the March 19th Presidential Primary Election.
“This is our 18th year of Early Voting in Chicago, and we’ve come a long way since 2006. Now, hundreds of thousands of Chicago’s voters prefer to Early Vote each election year. And we expect a big increase in Early Voting as the 50 Ward sites open for voters today,” said Marisel Hernandez, Chairwoman, Chicago Board of Election Commissioners.
Voters can still apply to Vote By Mail and the deadline to apply is March 14th at 5:00pm, though the Board recommends applying before then. Secure Drop Boxes at all 50 Ward sites are now open, and voters who choose to return their Vote By Mail ballot at any Drop Box at an Early Voting site, the Supersite at 191 N. Clark, or the Board Offices at 69 W. Washington.
Due to the court order that removed Ashonta C. Rice as a judicial candidate, all Democratic Vote By Mail ballots had to be reprinted and prepared to mail. These ballots started mailing this Monday, February 26 and have now all been mailed.
Currently, there have been over 165,000 applications to Vote By Mail in Chicago, with nearly 4,500 Vote By Mail ballots already returned.
Online voter registration has now closed in Illinois ahead of the March 19th Presidential Primary Election. Voters who still need to register to vote, as well as file a name or address change, can still do so at any Early Voting site ahead of and on Election Day, as well as at their precinct polling place on Election Day. Voters will need to bring two forms of ID, one of those which shows their current address.
Voters can go to the Your Voter Information page to verify their voter registration status ahead of the election, see and print their sample ballot, view the locations of nearby Early Voting sites, locate their precinct polling place for Election Day, and check on the status of their Vote By Mail application.
Additionally, 25 Early Voting sites are staffed with bilingual voting officials to assist voters in their preferred language. These sites will have new signage outside the location alerting voters to the bilingual official on site. All Early Voting sites have touchscreen voting machines and audio ballots in 12 languages: English, Spanish, Chinese, Hindi, Korean, Tagalog, Polish, Gujarati, Urdu, Ukrainian, Arabic, and Russian.