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So, if you’re watching this video the day that it was released, November 3, 2020, you
may know that today is election day in America.
If you’re watching this video any day after election day, congratulations: that means
that election day has passed and at least some level of civilization still exists, which
definitely wasn’t a given.
Given that the United States has famously always treated everyone equally and fairly,
you might be surprised to learn that right now, across the country, politicians are engaging
in blatant voter suppression: closing polling places, purging voters rolls, and putting
big signs on voting booths that say “DO NOT ENTER; BACHELORETTE SPOILERS INSIDE.”
But this isn’t a channel about the ways America systematically oppresses its most
vulnerable people and attempts to take away their most precious civic right; this is a
channel about silly little facts and goofs and stuff, which is why we’re gonna talk
about space voting.
The process for Americans voting in space is simple: a secret government lizard sends
a ballot to Studio 7 in Burbank, California, where the actors playing astronauts film their
space videos, the actor fills it out, and finally—okay wait a minute.
It looks like my research team has been getting their information from 4chan again.
Let’s do that over.
Back in 1996, astronaut John Blaha was about to be sent to the Russian Space Station Mir
when he realized, “hey, I sure would love to be able to vote on which guy is deciding
to shoot me up into the sky in defiance of both god and man.”
So he took the issue up with NASA, who then took it up with Texas, because nearly all
astronauts live in Houston near Johnson Space Center, and it turned out the while Texas
doesn’t like voting by poor people or people whose last names end with “o” or “z”,
they’re all for astronaut voting, and so they passed a state law in 1997, which set
up a process for voting from space.
The process begins with a Federal Postcard Application, a standard form for all US military
members, on which the astronaut indicates, among other things, which elections they want
to vote in—local, state, intergalactic, multidimensional, or federal.
But because Uncle Sam keeps forgetting his Wi-Fi password, that form must be physically
mailed in, so the astronaut must fill it out while they’re still on Earth, sometimes
a year in advance of the election.
As election day nears, the county clerk in the astronaut’s home county, which is usually
Harris county, will send a test ballot to Johnson Space Center, where someone—we don’t
know who, but I bet it’s Greg—will use a space station training computer to make
sure that the test ballot can successfully be filled out and sent back to the clerk.
Once the Clerk receives the “hey, yep, space ballot is a go” message, they’ll create
a secure electronic ballot, which is sent to Johnson Space Center, who uplinks it to
the ISS.
On the ISS, the astronaut will stop whatever magical floaty science they’re up to, go
into their email inbox, scroll past their space junk mail, and find a message with special
credentials sent from the County Clerk, which lets them access their ballot.
And then, they’ll simply fill it out, list their address as “low-earth orbit”—genuinely,
that’s not a joke—and downlink it to Johnson, who sends it to the County Clerk, who has
their own password which they must enter to access it.
Oh, and the astronaut must vote by 7 pm local time on Election Day, so it’s best they
give themselves plenty of space to do this important task: after all, the gravity of
voting is astronomical.
Now, you probably have one, key question: “how the heck does the international space
station have email or internet?”
That one takes some explaining.
So, basically, on Earth there are all these antennae on the ground called the Space Network,
and there are all these satellites in high orbit called TDRS, which stands for Totally,
Definitely Rockin’ Satellites, which are grouped over the Indian, Pacific and Atlantic
Oceans, and move in geosynchronous orbit—meaning their speed matches the Earth’s rotation,
so they are always above the same terrestrial spot.
The ISS sends data-carrying radio waves to whichever satellite is nearest, which zooms
them to the ground antennae, which swooshes the data through a landline to various NASA
centers.
Data goes to the ISS in the exact reverse way: centers whoosh data to antennae, antennae
zoom it to satellites, and satellites kabloosh it to the ISS.
Now, there are a lot of things exclusive to Americans: spray cheese, the electoral college,
girl scout cookies, dressing dogs like people, and electing pro wrestlers as governors: but
unlike those things, space voting is not an American-only phenomenon.
In 2020, Russian cosmonauts voted on proposed constitutional changes via both online ballots
and proxy voters—people on Earth designated to cast a vote on their behalf: the same process
used by a French astronaut in their 2017 election.
The other ISS partners, Canada and Japan, haven’t ever had astronauts vote from space—but
to be fair, they don’t have the same ongoing ISS presence as Russia and the US.
This year, in the 2020 Presidential election, American astronaut Kate Rubins has already
early voted from the ISS—which, speaking of, if you’re an American who hasn’t voted,
you should definitely stop watching this video and do that.
Like, now.
Like, seriously, now.
Go.
Well, maybe watch the ad read and then vote.
But definitely vote.
Please.
Please dear god, vote.
Maybe voting will be such a transformative personal experience for you that you’ll
want to write a whole essay about it.
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