For years, more and more people in Germany have been voting by postal vote. Corona is now accelerating this development. Experts expect around a third of postal voters in the federal election.
In the federal election in September, a record of postal votes is emerging due to the corona pandemic. “During the pandemic, even more voters came to appreciate the advantages of postal voting in the elections of the past few months,” said the Deutsche Post AG Board of Management for Post and Parcel Germany, Tobias Meyer, to the newspapers of the Funke media group.
“Since this form of voter participation works well and the postal vote is safe, we expect an even higher turnout compared to the previous federal election,” added Meyer. Deutsche Post is well prepared for the higher volume, assured the Post Board of Directors.
The trend towards postal voting has existed for years
“If we get a massive fourth wave in September, the percentage of postal voters will also increase significantly,” said Matthias Jung from the Election Research Group to the Funke newspapers. “Regardless of the pandemic, there has been a trend towards postal voting for years. It’s simply more convenient.” In the last general election, the percentage of postal voters was 28.6 percent.
Election notifications have been sent nationwide since Monday. According to Jung, voting behavior is becoming more and more variable, with many people only making their decisions shortly before the actual election day. “That continues to apply to the ballot box. But in fact, with an ever-increasing number of voters, the decision is made three or four weeks in advance via postal voting,” emphasized Jung.
“Postal voting share of over 30 percent”
The Kassel political scientist Wolfgang Schroeder assumes for the federal election “that we will definitely have a postal voter share of over 30 percent”. Traditionally, at the end of an election campaign there is talk of the final spurt, “actually the final spurt begins these days,” said the scientist to the Funke media. The fact that you have to request the postal voting documents yourself is certainly a complication.
The federal election will take place on September 26th.
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