Absentee ballot requests from military members and spouses are alarmingly low this election year, a voter advocacy group contends. It blames the Department of Defense for foot-dragging on absentee voter reforms that were enacted after the last presidential election.

A four-page report, “Military Voting Update: A Bleak Picture in 2012,” builds its worrisome conclusions on what arguably are some thin reeds of data on early ballot requests across nine states, all of which have large military populations and can track voter requests for absentee ballots.

They are Florida, Virginia, North Carolina, Illinois, Ohio, Alaska, Colorado, Louisiana and Nevada. Two states with the largest military populations, California and Texas, lack real time data on ballot requests.

Eric Eversole, executive director of the Military Voter Protection Project, is comfortable sounding this alarm to urge the military to improve support of absentee voters in these critical weeks before the Nov. 6 election.

Disappointment with military participation in the 2008 election, which totaled 53 percent versus 64 percent for the general electorate, spurred Congress to strengthen military and overseas voting protections in 2009 with passage of the Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment Act.

It requires states to establish more standard procedures to accommodate military and overseas voters. Voter registration requests and absentee ballot applications now can be emailed. States are required to transmit absentee ballots no later than 45 days before an election, which means by Sept. 22 this year.

The Act also requires the services to set up voting assistance offices on every military base. These offices, the MVPP explains in its report, are “to provide military voters with an opportunity to register, update their voting address and request an absentee ballot ‘as part of the administrative in-processing upon arrival at a new duty station.’”

That isn’t happening, the report says. Not only are military people not being offered voting assistance each time they report to a new duty station, but following department guidance from 2010, that military voter assistance be comparable to what civilians receive at state driver license branches and social service offices as mandated by the National Voter Registration Act, also has been ignored, the report contends.

As proof it cites performance data filed by voting assistance offices last year and posted on the Federal Voting Assistance Program website. “For example,” the report says, “in the second quarter of 2011, the Air Force reported it provided assistance at only seven of 22 installation voting assistance offices. In its third quarter report, the Air Force indicated only five service members received assistance from these offices.”

Asked to comment, the Defense Department’s Federal Voting Assistance Program issued a statement that it respects “the perspectives” in the report. It also “is committed to facilitating the absentee registration process” and makes “resources available to the greatest extent possible, communicating the availability of resources via myriad media.”

Data on yearly totals on voter assistance by the services, posted on the same FVAP website from which MVPP pulled quirky Air Force data, show that the service helped 104,000 voters last year. Army voter assistance offices said they helped 61,348, Marine Corps offices helped 13,671 and the Navy offices helped fewer than 4000 voters.

The MVPP projects a “remarkable decline” in military absentee ballots by comparing total ballots requested to date by military voters across the nine states with total absentee ballots requested in 2008. The disparity, which is as wide as 49,000 ballots in Florida, for example, “will be difficult to make up” in what time remains, the report concludes.

Eversole, who authored the report,conceded he couldn’t make an exact comparison of total ballot requests two months before the 2008 election and ballot requests today.

But Eversole said he is in close contact with state boards of election and officials share his concern that the size of the surge needed just to match 2008 absentee voting levels “is staggering.”

Data obtained Wednesday from the Virginia Board of Elections shows that in 2008 more than 36,000 military voters requested absentee ballots. So far this year fewer than 2000 military voters have requested ballots.

Don Palmer, secretary of the Virginia State Board of Elections, said he doesn’t challenge critics who say the Department of Defense and the services have “work to do” to implement reforms mandated by the MOVE Act.

“I am a reservist in the Navy. I’ve been doing it for 22 years. And obviously [voter support] isn’t their first priority,” Palmer said. “We struggle sometimes to have DoD show the same urgency because they have other missions. I understand that.”

Terry Wagoner, absentee voter coordinator for Virginia’s board of elections, said it is “still very early” to try to assess the level of military participation. The number of ballot requests will surge, she said. “Where I would start to become very concerned would be at that 45- day mark,” if numbers aren’t up sharply by then, she said.

On Aug. 24, Wagoner was set to host an afternoon of training on absentee voting procedures for voter assistance officers from Virginia’s nine military bases. Wagoner views Eversole, she said, as a partner in turning out the military vote, and she understands why his report sounds so gloomy.

“Eric’s job is to paint a bleak picture so he can go out there and make it better. I support him wholeheartedly,” Wagoner said. “But I refuse to let statistics stop me from doing everything I can” to help absentee voters.

Wagoner expects soon to be fielding 200 queries a day, via phone and email. Completed ballots will still have to be mailed. But with registration and ballot distribution now possible via email, she said, wait times should drop significantly and word should spread that the process has improved.

“The disappointment here is we’re going to have difficulty meeting 2008 numbers,” Eversole said, “which Congress said was the basis for sweeping reform. So are we really shooting for status quo?”

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Process already in place for military voters

M.O.V.E. Act

Steps the Defense Department’s Federal

Voting Assistance Program says it has taken to implement the Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment (M.O.V.E) Act. — Enhanced the FVAP.gov website with online wizards to guide service members and overseas citizens through registering to vote, requesting an absentee ballot, and obtaining a Federal Write-In Absentee

Ballot, as appropriate. The site also includes absentee voting information with links to election websites for all 55 states and territories. — Provided guidance and support to the services for establishing installation voter assistance offices, to include training IVA office staffs. — Expanded and improved unit voting assistance officer training. — Provided assistance and training to state and local election officials on the requirements of the MOVE Act, such as implementing the 45-day ballot delivery requirement. — Executed a broad voter education and outreach program.

Voting Assistance Office

DoD requirements for base Voting Assistance Offices: — Be included in the processing activities of reporting personnel and provide voting assistance for deploying personnel, personnel returning from deployment and personnel recording a change of address; — Provide written information on voter registration procedures and absentee ballot procedures; — Provide direct assistance to individuals in completing the forms to register to vote, update their voter registration information and request absentee ballots; — Transmit the completed Federal Post Card

Applications or National Voter Registration forms for the applicant, within five calendar days, to the appropriate local election office, if requested by the applicant; — Maintain monthly records of the number of citizens assisted, the number of forms provided to citizens, the number of forms mailed to local election officials and the number of forms taken by the citizen.

— Tom Philpott