Postal network redesign and mail ballot rejections in the 2026 primaries

2026 年初选的邮政网络重新设计和邮寄选票被拒绝

2026-09-23 · Brookings Institution · 原文

In 2025, the Postal Service changed how mail leaves thousands of post offices.

2025 年，邮政服务改变了邮件离开数千个邮局的方式。

Mail sent from those offices can now wait an extra day before beginning its journey.

从这些办公室发送的邮件现在可以在开始旅程之前额外等待一天。

Voters send their mail ballots back through those offices, and unlike most mail, those ballots must arrive by a deadline.

选民通过这些办公室寄回邮寄选票，与大多数邮件不同，这些选票必须在截止日期前送达。

The 2026 primaries were the next federal elections after this change and are the best available guide to what that may mean.

2026 年初选是这一变化后的下一次联邦选举，是了解这一变化可能意味着什么的最佳指南。

November will be the first general election since the change, with a far larger electorate.

11 月将是变革以来的首次大选，选民规模要大得多。

That change is part of Regional Transportation Optimization (RTO), a U.S. Postal Service (USPS) effort to run its transportation network more efficiently.

这一变化是区域运输优化 (RTO) 的一部分，这是美国邮政服务 (USPS) 为更有效地运行其运输网络而做出的努力。

RTO covers post offices that are more than 50 miles from the plant that processes their mail.

RTO 涵盖距离处理邮件的工厂 50 英里以上的邮局。

It is one part of Delivering for America (DFA), the agency’s 10-year plan to adjust the network to declining letter volumes.

这是美国投递 (DFA) 计划的一部分，该计划旨在调整网络以应对信件量下降的情况。

Three other developments followed, each relevant to whether a mailed ballot counts.

随后出现了另外三项进展，每一项都与邮寄选票是否有效有关。

In December 2025, USPS confirmed that a postmark may no longer show the day a piece of mail was sent.

2025 年 12 月，USPS 确认邮戳可能不再显示邮件的发送日期。

In June 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court left states free to count ballots that arrive after Election Day, provided they were postmarked on time.

2026 年 6 月，美国最高法院允许各州自由清点选举日之后送达的选票，前提是这些选票按时盖上邮戳。

Finally in August, at the direction of a March executive order , USPS issued a rule setting new requirements for ballot envelopes and for the data election officials must share with the agency about the ballots they mail.

最后，在 8 月份，根据 3 月份行政命令的指示，美国邮政局发布了一项规则，对选票信封和选举官员必须与该机构分享有关其邮寄选票的数据设定了新要求。

A federal court blocked that rule; and on September 14, the Supreme Court left the block in place , so it will not apply for the November general election.

联邦法院否决了该规则； 9月14日，最高法院决定保留该区块，因此不会适用于11月大选。

RTO is different.

RTO 则不同。

It changed how mail moves, not how ballots are counted.

它改变了邮件的传送方式，而不是计票的方式。

For a ballot mailed close to the deadline, an extra day can be the difference between being counted and rejected.

对于接近截止日期邮寄的选票，计算和拒绝之间可能会多一天的时间。

In this new analysis of the 2026 primaries in California, North Carolina, and Washington, I find that RTO exposure roughly doubled the rate at which mail ballots were rejected for arriving late.

在对加利福尼亚州、北卡罗来纳州和华盛顿州 2026 年初选的最新分析中，我发现 RTO 暴露使邮寄选票因迟到而被拒绝的比率大约增加了一倍。

Rejections for every other reason did not move differently where RTO applies, and before RTO, the places it now covers rejected late ballots at about the same rate as places it does not, in both the two preceding federal primaries and across a decade of general elections nationally.

在适用 RTO 的地方，因其他原因而被拒绝的情况并没有什么不同，在 RTO 之前，无论是在前两次联邦初选还是在过去十年的全国大选中，现在 RTO 覆盖的地方拒绝迟到选票的比例与未实施 RTO 的地方大致相同。

Using data from the 2022 and 2024 general elections, I estimate that roughly 40% of mail ballots returned by voters (16.6 million) come from places where the nearest post office is covered by RTO.

根据 2022 年和 2024 年大选的数据，我估计选民寄回的邮寄选票（1660 万张）中约有 40% 来自 RTO 覆盖的最近邮局的地方。

If the same relationship holds in November, tens of thousands of additional ballots could be rejected for arriving late, against a recent average of about 115,000 late rejections.

如果同样的关系在 11 月继续存在，那么数以万计的额外选票可能会因迟到而被拒绝，而最近平均有约 115,000 张迟到被拒绝。

The remedy is not complicated.

补救措施并不复杂。

Voters in covered places can mail their ballots a few days earlier, consistent with what USPS has long advised .

Knowing which places those are is harder.

知道那些地方是哪些地方比较困难。

USPS and election officials should make that easy to find out.

美国邮政局和选举官员应该让这一点很容易找到。

RTO is, in the Postal Service’s own words , an “effort to align transportation schedules between processing facilities and Post Office locations to improve operational efficiencies.” Each post office used to see two trucks a day, one to drop off mail in the morning and a second later in the day to pick up additional mail that had accumulated.

用邮政服务自己的话说，RTO 是“协调处理设施和邮局地点之间的运输时间表以提高运营效率的努力”。每个邮局每天都会看到两辆卡车，一辆在早上投递邮件，另一辆在当天晚些时候接收堆积的额外邮件。

Under RTO, post offices more than 50 miles from their regional plant were reduced to a single daily trip.

根据 RTO，距地区工厂 50 英里以上的邮局减少为每日一次。

Carriers still collect mail on their routes, and blue-box collections still occur on schedule.

承运人仍在其路线上收集邮件，蓝箱收集仍按计划进行。

But mail arriving after that truck has left now waits for the next day’s truck.

The reason given by USPS for this change is volume: single-piece First-Class Mail fell from 57 billion pieces in FY1997 to 12 billion in FY2023, so the second trip had come to carry very little additional mail.

USPS 给出的这一变化的原因是数量：单件普通邮件从 1997 财年的 570 亿件下降到 2023 财年的 120 亿件，因此第二趟运送的额外邮件很少。

The published service standard reflects this change .

For single-piece First-Class Mail originating from these zip codes, a day is added to the first leg of travel.

At the same time, USPS shortened its promised delivery times for longer distances, so many pieces of mail may be unaffected on net.

Ballots returned by voters are single-piece First-Class Mail, so a ballot mailed from a covered zip code is subject to that added day.

Who is affected by this change depends on where the covered post offices are and who lives nearest to them.

The Postal Service’s own location data identifies post offices by their exact location, and an October 2024 determination it filed with the Postal Regulatory Commission indicates which post offices are covered by RTO.

邮政服务自己的位置数据通过邮局的确切位置来识别邮局，并且其 2024 年 10 月向邮政管理委员会提交的一份决定表明哪些邮局受到 RTO 的覆盖。

I assign every census block in the country (the smallest unit of Census geography, roughly a city block in a town and larger in rural areas) to its nearest post office, and I count the voting-age population in the blocks whose nearest post office is covered by RTO.

我将全国的每个人口普查街区（人口普查地理的最小单位，大致是城镇中的一个城市街区，农村地区更大）分配给最近的邮局，并计算 RTO 覆盖的最近邮局所在街区的投票年龄人口。

I characterize a county’s exposure as the share of its voting-age adults living in those blocks.

Exposure is measured by designation as opposed to implementation.

The October 2024 filing records which offices were planned for RTO, not which have already adjusted their operations.

USPS reports implementation separately , by zip code, and as of September 2026, roughly 58% of designated offices nationally were operating on the new schedule.

USPS 按邮政编码单独报告实施情况，截至 2026 年 9 月，全国大约 58% 的指定办事处按照新时间表运营。

Roughly 121 million of the country’s 257 million voting-age adults in the 48 contiguous states and Washington, D.C., live nearest to a covered post office.

美国 48 个邻近州和华盛顿特区的 2.57 亿投票年龄成年人中，约有 1.21 亿人居住在距离有盖邮局最近的地方。

Table 1 compares them with those whose nearest post office is not covered.

Half of them (49.2%) live in a small town or rural area, compared to just 8.8% for those not covered.

They are also more elderly, poorer, and more likely to have a disability.

And they are more likely to be White, which follows from their geographic distribution: rural America is Whiter than the country as a whole .

RTO activations began rolling out in 2025.

RTO 激活将于 2025 年开始推出。

The next federal elections were the 2026 primaries, and they are the only ones that can be observed before November.

California, North Carolina, and Washington each held primary elections and report how many mail ballots voters in each county returned, how many were rejected, and why, with late arrival recorded as its own category.

加利福尼亚州、北卡罗来纳州和华盛顿州分别举行了初选，并报告每个县有多少邮寄选票选民返回、有多少邮寄选票被拒绝以及原因，并将迟到记录为自己的类别。

All three also report the same detail for the 2022 and 2024 primaries, both held before RTO, so 2026 rejection rates can be compared with those from before the change.

这三者还报告了 2022 年和 2024 年初选的相同细节，这两次初选均在 RTO 之前举行，因此可以将 2026 年的拒绝率与变更前的拒绝率进行比较。

These three states differ in how a late ballot is handled.

这三个州在处理迟到投票的方式上有所不同。

In California and Washington, which both mail a ballot to every registered voter, a ballot that is postmarked by Election Day still counts even if it arrives later.

在加利福尼亚州和华盛顿州，这两个州都向每位登记选民邮寄选票，盖有选举日邮戳的选票即使较晚到达，仍然有效。

A voter in North Carolina must request an absentee ballot, and the state ended its grace period before the 2024 election.

So a ballot must arrive by Election Day, or it does not count.

因此，选票必须在选举日之前送达，否则不算数。

Ballots can be rejected for several reasons: a signature that does not match the one on file, a missing witness line, a missing date.

选票可能因多种原因被拒绝：签名与存档的签名不符、缺少见证线、缺少日期。

In all three states and in each of the three federal primaries between 2022 and 2026, most rejections were for arriving too late to be counted (Figure 1).

在所有三个州以及 2022 年至 2026 年期间的三场联邦初选中，大多数被拒绝的原因是到达得太晚而无法统计（图 1）。

Estimating RTO’s effect on late-arriving ballots is complicated because rejection rates can move for many reasons that have nothing to do with the mail: how many people vote by mail, how carefully they complete the ballot envelope, how a state runs its elections.

估计 RTO 对迟到选票的影响很复杂，因为拒绝率可能会因与邮寄无关的许多原因而变化：有多少人通过邮寄投票，他们填写选票信封的仔细程度，一个州如何进行选举。

RTO’s reach, however, varies from county to county, and this variation makes it possible to separate its effect from these other forces.

然而，RTO 的影响范围因县而异，这种差异使得将其影响与其他力量区分开来成为可能。

RTO coverage is close to all-or-nothing in most places.

在大多数地方，RTO 的覆盖范围几乎是全有或全无。

In these three states, for example, 84% of counties are either less than 10% covered or more than 90% covered, and only six of the 197 sit between 40% and 60%.

例如，在这三个州，84% 的县的覆盖率低于 10% 或超过 90%，而 197 个州中只有 6 个县的覆盖率在 40% 到 60% 之间。

I divide counties into two groups: those where most residents’ nearest post office was covered by RTO and those where most were not.

我将县分为两组：大多数居民最近的邮局已覆盖 RTO 的县和大多数没有覆盖的县。

This division makes the comparison easy to see.

这种划分使得比较很容易看出。

If rejection rates in the two groups moved together before the change and apart afterward, the difference between them is likely to be driven by RTO itself.

如果两组的拒绝率在变化之前一致变化，而变化之后则不同，那么它们之间的差异很可能是由 RTO 本身驱动的。

At the same time, few counties sit near the line, and the technical appendix shows that these results are not sensitive to where the line is drawn.

与此同时，很少有县位于该线附近，技术附录显示这些结果对该线的绘制位置并不敏感。

Figure 2 shows the rejection rate for each group in each of the three primaries.

图 2 显示了三场初选中每组的拒绝率。

For primaries that were held before RTO (2022 and 2024), the two groups look alike in each state; and when rejection rates moved, they moved together.

对于 RTO（2022 年和 2024 年）之前举行的初选，每个州的两个群体看起来都很相似；当拒绝率发生变化时，它们也会一起变化。

That is what makes the uncovered counties useful: they can provide a reasonable estimate of how much rejection rates would have moved in 2026 regardless of RTO.

这就是未覆盖县的有用之处：无论 RTO 如何，它们都可以合理估计 2026 年拒绝率的变化。

Instead of moving together in 2026, the groups separate.

到 2026 年，这些群体并没有一起迁徙，而是分开了。

Rejection rates rose sharply in counties where most residents’ nearest post office was covered and held steady or fell in the rest; the difference is what is attributed to RTO.

在大多数居民最近的邮局都有覆盖的县，拒绝率急剧上升，而在其他县则保持稳定或下降；区别在于 RTO 的差异。

Comparing the change in one group with the change in a comparable group is an estimation strategy called “difference-in-differences.”

将一组的变化与可比组的变化进行比较是一种称为“双重差异”的估计策略。

Using this comparison, I estimate that across all three states RTO exposure increased the rate at which mail ballots were rejected for arriving late by 96%, or about one percentage point.

通过这种比较，我估计，在所有三个州，RTO 暴露导致邮寄选票因迟到而被拒绝的比率增加了 96%，即大约一个百分点。

The size of the effect differs by state: the rate rose about 142% in Washington (1.1 points), 86% in California (0.9 points), and 61% in North Carolina (1.9 points).

影响的大小因州而异：华盛顿州的这一比率上升了约 142%（1.1 个百分点），加利福尼亚州上升了 86%（0.9 个百分点），北卡罗来纳州上升了 61%（1.9 个百分点）。

North Carolina’s proportional increase is the smallest because it is scaled by its baseline rejection rate, which was already several times higher than in the other states.

北卡罗来纳州的增幅最小，因为它是根据其基线拒绝率来衡量的，而该州的基线拒绝率已经是其他州的几倍。

Its estimate is also the least statistically precise, likely because voters in two-thirds of its counties returned fewer than 100 mail ballots in the 2026 primary.

它的估计在统计上也是最不准确的，可能是因为三分之二的县的选民在 2026 年初选中寄回的邮寄选票不到 100 张。

Estimates for California, Washington, and the three taken together are statistically significant, meaning chance is an unlikely explanation for the observed increase.

对加利福尼亚州、华盛顿州以及这三个州的估计值在统计上具有显着性，这意味着偶然性不太可能解释所观察到的增长。

The technical appendix provides more detail on the full results, explains how they are estimated, and shows that they are insensitive to how counties are divided into two groups based on RTO exposure.

技术附录提供了完整结果的更多详细信息，解释了它们的估计方式，并表明它们对如何根据 RTO 暴露将县分为两组不敏感。

A second test uses the same county groups and the same elections but studies a different outcome: ballots rejected for any reason other than late arrival, including a missing signature or missing date.

第二个测试使用相同的县组和相同的选举，但研究不同的结果：选票因迟到以外的任何原因被拒绝，包括缺少签名或缺少日期。

These ballot rejections should not respond to a change in mail transportation.

这些选票拒绝不应响应邮件运输的变化。

Figure 3 shows those rejection rates for both groups of counties, on the same scale as Figure 2.

图 3 显示了两组县的拒绝率，其比例与图 2 相同。

Rejection rates for other reasons did move between elections, and they moved in both groups in the same way.

由于其他原因而导致的拒绝率在两次选举之间确实发生了变化，而且两组的变化情况相同。

The gap that opened for late rejections in 2026 does not appear here.

2026 年因延迟拒绝而出现的差距并未出现在这里。

Across the three states, the estimated effect of RTO on other rejections is a decrease of 0.1 percentage points, about a tenth the size of the increase estimated for late rejections.

在这三个州中，RTO 对其他拒绝的估计影响减少了 0.1 个百分点，大约是迟到拒绝的估计增幅的十分之一。

This estimate is not statistically significant.

这一估计在统计上并不显着。

This comparison has limits, however, and the most important one is that exposure to RTO is not randomly assigned.

然而，这种比较有其局限性，最重要的一点是 RTO 的暴露并不是随机分配的。

RTO applies when a post office is far from its processing plant, which is overwhelmingly more likely in rural America.

RTO 适用于邮局远离其加工厂的情况，这种情况在美国农村地区更为常见。

As a result, counties that are more and less exposed may differ in many ways besides the mail.

因此，除了邮件之外，暴露程度较高和较少的县可能在许多方面有所不同。

The two groups moved together in 2022 and 2024, and the comparison assumes that they would have continued to.

这两个群体在 2022 年和 2024 年一起搬迁，比较假设他们会继续这样做。

If, however, something else changed for rural voters between 2024 and 2026, it would appear here as an effect of RTO.

然而，如果 2024 年至 2026 年间农村选民发生其他变化，这里就会表现为 RTO 的影响。

Counties are also grouped by whether their post offices are designated for RTO, not by whether the new schedule has been implemented .

县还按照其邮局是否被指定用于 RTO 进行分组，而不是按照新时间表是否已实施进行分组。

By the time these primaries occurred, 98% of designated offices in Washington were operating on the new schedule, 75% in California, and 31% in North Carolina.

到这些初选举行时，华盛顿 98% 的指定办事处都按照新时间表运行，其中加利福尼亚州为 75%，北卡罗来纳州为 31%。

North Carolina’s lower implementation rate is likely another reason why its estimate is the least precise of the three states.

北卡罗来纳州较低的实施率可能是其估计在三个州中最不精确的另一个原因。

RTO designation is the right basis for comparison because it was determined based on distance from a processing plant and in advance of the 2026 primaries being studied, rather than based on anything related to how people vote.

RTO 指定是比较的正确基础，因为它是根据距加工厂的距离以及正在研究的 2026 年初选之前确定的，而不是根据与人们投票方式相关的任何因素。

The order of implementation, by contrast, is the Postal Service’s own scheduling decision, which could respond to such factors.

相比之下，实施顺序是邮政服务自己的调度决策，可以对这些因素做出反应。

The consequence of this choice is that the exposed group includes some places where nothing has changed yet, which narrows the gap between the two groups of counties and, all else equal, biases the estimates toward zero.

这种选择的结果是，暴露组包括一些尚未发生任何变化的地方，这缩小了两组县之间的差距，并且在其他条件相同的情况下，使估计值偏向于零。

The 2026 primaries are not general elections, and anticipating what may happen in November requires accounting for the difference.

2026 年初选不是大选，预测 11 月可能发生的情况需要考虑到其中的差异。

A general election, for example, draws much higher ballot volumes, and it draws them from voters who participate less regularly.

例如，大选会吸引更多的选票，而且这些选票来自那些不经常参与的选民。

A general election also receives far more public attention, which could mean more voters return ballots well before the deadline rather than close to it.

大选也受到更多公众关注，这可能意味着更多选民在截止日期之前而不是临近截止日期之前交回选票。

Those differences can push the effect of RTO in either direction.

这些差异可能会向任一方向推动 RTO 的效果。

Millions of ballots are returned by mail in every general election, and that number varies across election cycles.

每次大选都会通过邮寄方式退回数百万张选票，而且这个数字在不同的选举周期中会有所不同。

The Election Administration and Voting Survey (EAVS), which the U.S. Election Assistance Commission collects from local election offices after every federal election, records how many mail ballots each jurisdiction received and how many it rejected, with late arrival recorded as its own category.

美国选举援助委员会在每次联邦选举后从地方选举办公室收集的选举管理和投票调查 (EAVS) 记录了每个司法管辖区收到的邮寄选票数量和拒绝的邮寄选票数量，并将迟到记录为自己的类别。

In the two most recent midterm elections, which are the cycles that most resemble the coming election in November, election officials nationwide reported 30.4 million mail ballots returned in 2018 and 36.7 million in 2022.

在最近的两次中期选举中，全国选举官员报告称，2018 年有 3,040 万张邮寄选票被退回，2022 年有 3,670 万张邮寄选票被退回。

Presidential years run higher, at 33.4 million in 2016 and 48.0 million in 2024.

总统任期内的人数不断增加，2016 年为 3,340 万，2024 年为 4,800 万。

The pandemic election of 2020 stands apart, at 70.6 million.

2020 年的大流行选举与众不同，有 7060 万人参加。

Late-arrival rejections are uncommon in general elections.

在大选中迟到被拒绝的情况并不常见。

Between 0.2% and 0.4% of mail ballots returned were rejected for arriving after the deadline in each of the five most recent election cycles, with 2020 the exception at 0.1%.

在最近五个选举周期中，有 0.2% 至 0.4% 的邮寄选票因在截止日期之后送达而被拒绝，2020 年例外，为 0.1%。

Averaged over the last two general elections, roughly 115,000 ballots nationally were rejected for arriving late.

过去两次大选中，全国平均约有 115,000 张选票因迟到而被拒绝。

They are also no more common in places that became newly exposed to RTO for the 2026 election.

在 2026 年选举中新接触 RTO 的地方，这种情况也不再常见。

Figure 4 again divides counties into those where most residents’ nearest post office is now covered by RTO and those where most are not.

图 4 再次将县分为大多数居民最近的邮局现在已被 RTO 覆盖的县和大多数居民没有覆盖的县。

In every cycle over the last decade, the two lines sit on top of each other, with the gap between them within a tenth of a percentage point.

在过去十年的每个周期中，两条线都相互重叠，两者之间的差距在十分之一个百分点以内。

Whatever else distinguishes these places—and much likely does—their mail ballots arrived on time at the same rate.

无论这些地方还有什么不同之处（而且很可能如此），它们的邮寄选票都以相同的速度准时到达。

中文为机器翻译，仅供参考。