07182016Mon
Last updateFri, 15 Jul 2016 8am

US Consulate, voting advocates bend over backwards to increase participation in November election

In observance of July the Fourth, the U.S. Citizen Services office at the consulate in Guadalajara is encouraging voters residing locally to take steps to vote in the November election.

“Celebrate democracy this Fourth of July by taking the necessary steps to vote in the 2016 U.S. elections!” the office urged in an e-mail.

And U.S. voter groups in Mexico are doing likewise, including the non-partisan American Benevolent Society in Mexico City and Democrats Abroad (DA).

“Historically, a large number of eligible voters residing in Mexico have chosen not to participate in the electoral process,” said Larry Pihl, chair of the DA Lake Chapala chapter, adding that the group plans efforts to get people who may have never voted to request absentee ballots from appropriate stateside districts. “A surprising number of citizens living abroad don’t even know they can vote.”

The U.S. Embassy in Mexico City has trained voting assistants from the American Benevolent Society there, according to Barbara Franco, the group’s executive director. 

And U.S. Consulate staff here are on the same wavelength. Even “if you have never voted while overseas before, the process is easy,” the consulate reassures citizens, advising prospective voters to visit FVAP.gov to begin the process and noting that people with questions may contact the Voting Assistance Officer in Guadalajara (at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.). 

Even Jalisco Governor Aristoteles Sandoval got in on the act when he was in Chicago and Los Angeles early in June to launch Migrants Centers there. (Guadalajara Reporter, June 3, 2016) He urged eligible Mexican-Americans to exercise their right to vote and thus support the “positive advances” made between the United States and Mexico.

Similarly, Democrats Abroad International Chair Katie Solon said that DA is “getting ready to be more helpful to Spanish-language-preference voters … in this critical election. And we think this year more Americans will vote from outside the U.S. than ever before.”

Pihl noted that DA voter assistants get considerable training in using www.VoteFromAbroad.org to help people request ballots. Using either this site or FVAP.gov and ready with their social security or passport number and a stateside address, citizens from all states fill out forms that are tailored to their state, receive ballot requests and ballots by e-mail or fax, print them out (including postage-paid envelopes), sign and return them through their local U.S. consulate. 

“The U.S. Consulate in Guadalajara bends over backwards to help by accepting these materials, which they send to voting districts via their consular mail service,” Pihl said.

Pete Marigliano, chief of U.S. Citizen Services at the consulate, said that the postage-paid envelopes generated by the websites (or regular envelopes bearing U.S. stamps) can be dropped off at the consulate window on Avenida Lopez Cotilla near Progresso without an appointment, “ideally between 2 and 2:45 p.m. Monday through Friday.” 

Marigliano also emphasized that consular employees pick up envelopes for mailing from a secured “ballot box” at the Lake Chapala Society in Ajijic, during their regularly scheduled visits. 

He added that normal transit time from Guadalajara to the United States is 30 days. Some users, however, report a shorter transit time.

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