Center for Vulnerable Voters
The vote they can’t defend themselves
Seniors, service members, the disabled, and the homebound. We give vulnerable voters, and the people who care for them, the tools to protect every ballot.
Federal guidance · July 20, 2026
The Center for Vulnerable Voters has long recommended using bipartisan election teams for residential voting and has warned staff against completing voter-registration or ballot applications—or marking ballots—without the resident voter’s authorization. CVV applauds these changes and stands ready to partner with residential communities, offering complimentary resources and consultation to help ensure alignment with CMS guidelines.
Read the CMS memo →QSSAM-26-04-NH · PDF, 3 pages
The problem, in one family’s words
“I felt like I had been punched in the gut.”
Mary’s mother has non-verbal dementia and can’t name the president, let alone request a ballot. Yet the records showed she’d “voted” in 2020. Stories like hers are not rare, they’re the predictable result of a system that leaves the most vulnerable unguarded.
Read Lori Roman’s full account →The evidence on the ground · Illinois, November 2022
With written permission from both facilities, an occupational therapist interviewed residents who had voted in the 2022 election. She had to abandon her questionnaire almost immediately: the questions were too difficult for nearly everyone, and several residents could not state their own name.
The full findings, facility by facility: who was interviewed, what they could and couldn’t recall, and what the ballot records show.
Download the case study →Thinks he voted. Says someone he didn’t know helped him. He had a hard time working out which person to vote for as President, and could not answer any further questions.
Did not know who he was voting for. He could not hold a conversation long enough to answer anything further.
Said he voted, and that he voted for Kennedy. He filled out his ballot in the community room and signed the back. Asked one more question, he walked away.
Residents’ names were changed to protect their privacy. Two ballots were requested on the same day and returned on the same day.
Wisconsin · Office of the Special Counsel, March 2022
Wisconsin law says sworn deputies must supervise voting inside care facilities. In 2020 the state suspended them, and sent every clerk a training document telling facility staff what they could do instead. This is what it said, word for word.
As a care facility administrator or staff member, you are able to:
Reproduced in the Second Interim Report, p. 86. Under Wis. Stat. § 6.875, the only people who may help a resident mark a ballot inside a facility are those sworn deputies and the resident’s own immediate family.
| County | Facilities | Registered | Voted | Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Milwaukee | 30 | 1,084 | 1,084 | 100% |
| Dane | 24 | 723 | 723 | 100% |
| Brown | 16 | 280 | 265 | 95% |
| Racine | 12 | 348 | 348 | 100% |
| Kenosha | 9 | 866 | 841 | 97% |
Ninety-one facilities in five counties. The report is explicit that this covers only the facilities its investigators were able to audit, not the whole state, and that the figures could move as more are checked.
It is appalling to me that an appointed, unelected group of volunteers, has enough authority to change how some of our most vulnerable citizens access voting. Residents who did not request ballots voted because someone else made a request for a ballot on their behalf and then voted on their behalf. If even one person’s right to freely choose to vote or not to vote was diminished, then a travesty of justice has occurred.
The news conference · October 28, 2021
Racine County Sheriff Christopher Schmaling, announcing what his investigators found inside a Racine County care facility. His office went on to recommend charges against five members of the commission.
Video: FOX6 News Milwaukee. The Elections Commission rejected the allegations, saying its guidance kept care-facility residents from being disenfranchised.
Source: CDC National Center for Health Statistics, National Post-acute and Long-term Care Study, 2022.
Who’s at risk
Each faces a different obstacle between them and a ballot that counts. Start with the group you want to protect.
You Can Help
Facility staff, family members, and poll workers are the front line. These free guides show them exactly what the law requires, and what to watch for.
Browse all resources →From the field
Reporting, guides, and case work as it happens.
Stay with it
Case findings, state guidance and the residential-voting fights as they happen. We send when there is something worth sending.
