Sedgwick County election office preparing for Presidential Preference Primary

WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) – The Sedgwick County election office wants you to be aware of upcoming deadlines as the Kansas Presidential Preference Primary gets closer.

The election is March 19, and now we are exactly a month away.

Tuesday, Feb. 20, is the deadline to register to vote in this election. It is also the last day to apply for an advance mail ballot.

“If you would like to vote by mail, your application must be in our hands by the end of business tomorrow, which is 5 p.m., so that we can process that and get a mail ballot out to you,” Sedgwick County election commissioner Laura Rainwater said.

Advance mail ballot applications are available at sedgwickcounty.org. Completed forms must be signed and received by mail or in person at the Sedgwick County Election Office by Feb. 20. You can also email the completed form to [email protected] or fax it to 316-660-7125 by 5 p.m.

Mail ballots are due by 7 p.m. on Election Day, which means there is no grace period. Dropping it into a mailbox and getting postmarked on Election Day does not count.

“That’s a huge difference from all other elections because all other elections, if the ballot is postmarked by Election Day, we can count it for up to three days after the election,” Rainwater said.

This is the first Presidential Preference Primary in Kansas since 1992, so voters aren’t exactly used to going to the polls in March. But Rainwater hopes that election turnout brings good numbers. However, only registered Democrats and Republicans will vote in this election.

“If you’re unaffiliated, you can declare a party on election day and receive that party’s ballot. They are the only ones that aren’t already registered for the Democrat or Republican party that can get a ballot,” Rainwater said.

So, if you’re a registered libertarian or part of the “No Labels Party,” you cannot vote in this election unless you switch parties by Feb. 20.

Rainwater says the most important aspect of this election is voting by mail.

“The biggest impact to voters I see for this election circles around the mail ballots. Because people are used to applying for mail ballots up until a week before each election, they can request a mail ballot. And if you want a mail ballot, you have to do so by tomorrow,” Rainwater said.

Rainwater says there are 14 ballot drop boxes across Sedgwick County, so if you drop your ballot in one of those boxes by 7 p.m. or at a polling location on election day, you are good to go. Also, dropping your ballot in a mailbox on election day does not count.

Rainwater says one of the struggles for this election has been getting enough election workers for all the polling sites. The county added 17 new polling locations for this election and three early voting sites, so they needed 600 to 650 election workers.

“We’re really having a hard time staffing election sites like in Andale and Colwich and Cheney and the outlying cities. So, if there are voters out there that want to help us out and work the polls for us, we sure could use you. Contact us on our website, there’s a link right on the landing page to be an election worker and more information is found there,” Rainwater said.

Rainwater has also received lots of questions regarding who is going to be on this ballot.

“I’ve had a lot of questions about some of the candidates that have dropped out of the race for president. Their names are still on the ballot because they dropped out after the close of the filing deadline, which is also the drop deadline. So their names will still appear on the ballot, so they still will get some votes even though they’re technically not in the race anymore,” Rainwater said.