Hi, I'm Peabody Award-wanting investigative
journalist Desi Lydic.
Elections, they're the bedrock of democracy,
and the only thing preventing us from not having elections.
But is America's election system reliable,
or are we one glitchy voting machine
away from a total collapse?
I'll investigate in our new segment,
"Votedemic 2022, Our Crumbling Election Infrastructure."
After our nation's last elections went super smooth.
Dozens of voters were locked out of the one single polling
place for all of Louisville.
Reports of hours of long lines,
voting machine malfunctions, provisional ballot shortages.
Officials are looking at calling in the National Guard.
I wanted to find out how ready we are for the midterms,
so I'm headed to our nation's capital
to talk with election advocates at the Democracy Fund.
My name is Tammy Patrick.
I'm a senior advisor to the elections team
at the Democracy Fund, which seeks to ensure that we have
an open and just democracy that is inclusive and trustworthy
for all of our citizens.
Ooh, it sounds like you got your work cut out for you.
We do in this moment.
There's a lot of work to be done,
but it may not be in the areas that necessarily think it is.
All right, what are all the problems
for this upcoming election?
So we continue to see a shortage of poll workers,
the global supply chain issues, underfunding of our
election infrastructure.
Wait, wait, wait, Tammy, Tammy, Tammy, let's start
with the most pressing issue.
Well, one of the most pressing issues
in this moment, because of where we are in the election
cycle, is a paper shortage.
Paper?
Tammy, it's 2022, who's using paper to vote?
So the vast majority of Americans
actually cast a paper ballot.
Yeah, no, I knew that.
I vote every election.
I got the stickers to prove it.
Well, that's great, but election offices
all around this country have ordered their ballots,
they've ordered envelopes, they've
ordered paper materials that they need,
and they may not get them in time
for the upcoming election.
Who's going to be affected by this paper shortage most?
What it looks like is going to happen,
will be those small election offices serving
rural communities where they don't have
a large service provider that's helping
them take care of this issue.
Are you saying that the rural community, am I, rural.
Am I saying that right?
Rural.
The rural, OK, you know what I'm saying.
As I learned about this large swath of Americans, rural,
rural, I realize this paper shortage
could affect a lot of people.
Well, I guess I got to go find some paper people.
Oh, wait, there's more to talk about.
Can it, Tammy.
But can America just sneak some printer paper home
from work like the rest of us?
I went to Runbeck Election Services, one of the largest
ballot printing facilities, to get an inside look at how dire
the paper shortage is.
We print ballots for several states and counties
across the nation.
We're in 23 states, plus Washington, DC,
with some of our products.
Wow.
So you're a huge part of the voting process.
Yeah.
We touch roughly 45% to 50% of the voters around the country.
You touch a lot of voters.
Yep.
But with consent.
Absolutely.
So what's going on with this paper shortage?
It started during COVID.
When the paper mills shut down, they
couldn't generate more paper.
So they sold through all their inventory.
And then when they started going back to work,
they converted to liner board for cardboard boxes.
Amazon still needs to ship things.
[bleep] Bezos, man.
And now we don't have the inventory any longer,
and so they're trying to play catch-up.
And you're saying there's a paper
shortage happening right now.
Yes.
Jeff, I don't know how to tell you this,
but I see a [bleep] ton of paper around here.
So what you see here on our production floor
is a fraction of what we need for the whole year.
Every day we'll go through 65 of those rolls.
65 of these roles?
Yes.
Jesus Christ.
Historically, we could order paper,
and in two to three weeks we would have what we need.
Now it's three to four months or more.
And that's been the problem this year.
How bad are we talking?
Like we might need to start printing double-sided bad?
Or the majority of Americans won't get
to choose their president bad?
Well, let's hope it doesn't get to that.
Everybody is working to avoid that very problem.
But we already do print double-sided ballots,
so there is, we already print on both sides of the paper.
Jeff, that means it's bad.
Kind of.
Walk me through everything that
would be affected if the election
community runs out of paper.
If there's no paper, it's hard to mail
ballots, envelopes, I Voted stickers,
and instructions sheets.
Wait, wait, voting stickers?
Voting stickers could be gone.
Could be.
But the sticker's the best part of voting,
the only reason I vote.
Could also do digital stickers.
Instead of getting the physical sticker,
you get a digital sticker when you vote.
Jeff, that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.
Fair enough.
OK, I just have a few more questions.
[paper crumpling]
No.
Ah, yes.
What can Americans do to help with the paper shortage?
Stop wasting paper.
[paper crumpling]
Cursive.
Why am I writing in cursive?
Stop wasting paper.
Yeah.
All right, you want to take me on a tour?
- Sure. - I'm ready to go to work.
All right, let's go.
You're going to wear a hard hat?
Yeah, that's what you do, right?
No.
It was time to roll up my sleeves,
so I didn't get ink on them.
Gross.
This paper palace was pumping.
And it turns out, there's a lot more to printing
than just hitting Control-P.
So this is where it all starts.
We get the files from the county, the PDFs,
so we can start the print process.
Ah.
Let me ask you a question.
Does PDF really stand for please don't [bleep]??
No.
I could see how crucial paper was to this process.
So every roll of paper will generate about 1,000 ballots.
When we're running in an election,
we'll be running 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
These runs 24 hours a day?
Yes.
Wait, what's happening?
This machine just ran out of paper.
Happening already.
I even presented Jeff with some of my own solutions
to stopping the shortage.
So this is the inserter.
This is where the ballots, the I Voted sticker,
the instructions, all go into the envelope
to be mailed out to the voter.
You say the stickers?
Yeah, I voted stickers, yes.
These ones right here.
Yes.
Wow.
Oh, wow.
So even if a paper shortage does ruin America's democracy,
at least I'll be able to participate
in the most important part of the voting process.