(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa Democratic Party has mailed a second round of absentee ballot request forms to about 36-thousand Iowa voters this month. The shape of the forms in the first mailing prevented them from being automatically processed by Postal Service machines. Iowa Democratic Party Chair Rita Hart. “There was a change in postal regulations that took our vendor by surprise and so those absentee ballot requests have been sent out again,” Hart says, “and we have worked with our county auditors across the state to resolve that issue.”

A spokesperson for Iowa Democrats says the party received a call on September 9th that there was a problem with the shape of the ballot request form. New forms were sent to the same voters on September 17th, along with information urging them to submit a new request in case their first wasn’t processed. Nearly 60 percent of the Iowa voters who received both mailings have submitted absentee ballot requests according to the Iowa Democratic Party.

Iowa Democratic Party chair Rita Hart during an appearance on Iowa Press, on Iowa PBS

Early voting in Iowa starts October 16th and that’s the date county auditors may begin mailing out absentee ballots.