You can still cast your ballot even if you're not on Earth.
The three Americans currently living aboard the International Space Station have plenty of time to vote.
In a NASA video Q&A posted in November 2020, Kate Rubins explained how off- Earth voting works.
She said in the video that it was similar to voting by Absentee Ballot from home.
Rubins filled out a Federal Postcard Application before she left. The FPCA is used for people who are overseas during an election, such as military members and their families, and is similar to the Absentee Ballot application many other US citizens fill out.
The NASA Astronaut explains how she did it in the video.
NASA says that most astronauts who vote while in space choose to vote as Texas residents because they move to Houston for training before their mission starts. There is a 1997 state law in Texas that allows for legal voting from space, with an Absentee ballot system for astronauts to vote.
NASA has to make sure that the ballot can be filled out. A test ballot is sent to NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston by the county clerk in order to see if someone can fill it out.
The real ballot is sent to the astronauts on the International Space Station if the test goes well. The voting crew member is given credentials by the clerk to open the ballot. The astronauts fill out the form online and send it back to the county clerk to vote. The only person who can open the email is the clerk.
Voting astronauts need to send in their vote by 7pm. The time for the vote to be counted is central time.
Rubins created her own voting booth on the space station in 2020. She put a hand-written sign on the door of her quarters and closed it.
She said in the video that they had a small area where they slept and had their computer. It seems like it would be about the right size for a voting booth at home, since it is a private area on the space station.
Rubins has been a voter. In 2016 she was on the space station.
The story was changed on Nov. 7, 2022,
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