Updated: September 27, 2020 4:59:27 pm
NASA astronaut Kate Rubins, who will be aboard the International Space Station (ISS) on the day of the US presidential election, will cast her vote from space. (Photo: (NASA / GCTC / Andrey Shelepin via AP)
NASA astronaut Kate Rubins, who will be aboard the International Space Station (ISS) on the day of the US presidential election. will cast your vote from space, the Associated Press reported. The ISS is more than 200 miles away and orbits the Earth at 17,000 miles per hour. On board the ISS, missions can last more than six months and American astronauts have been able to cast their vote through a special absentee voting system.
How is this possible?
In 1997, a bill passed by Texas legislatures established the technical voting process for astronauts, all of whom live in Texas, and gave them the ability to vote remotely from space. In the 2016 presidential election, astronauts Edward Michael Fincke and Greg Chamitoff, who lived and worked aboard the ISS, cast their vote by accessing a secure secret ballot.
In 1997, David Wolf of NASA became the first astronaut to use this arrangement while aboard the Russian Mir space station.
How does the system work?
The rule states that a person who is on a space flight during the early voting period or on Election Day can vote by this method as long as they request it using a Federal Postcard Application (FPCA). “The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (” NASA “) shall submit in writing to the Secretary of State a method for transmitting and receiving a secret ballot for persons on a space flight during an election period,” the rule states.
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According to a blog post published by NASA, the voting process begins a year before launch, when astronauts are supposed to select which elections (local / state / federal) they want to participate in while in space. After this, six months before the election, the astronauts receive a standard form called “Application for Voter Registration and Absentee Ballot – Application for Federal Postcard.”
One day before US Election Day, an encrypted electronic ballot is sent to the astronauts, who then use a set of unique credentials that are individually emailed to them. In this way, they can access their ballots and, after casting their vote, link them back to Earth to the county clerk’s office.
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