Early voting reporting, workday election days, mail ballots — there’s a better, simpler, tested way
Say what you like about the results of Israel’s election, but the country knows how to run an election.
Election day is a public holiday. So . . .
No one needs to skip work to vote.
No disputes over mail ballots arise, since all voting is in person.
No confusion about late counted absentee ballots, since there are virtually none.
Most important, no worries about patriotism, about taking democracy for granted, about skipping the vote out of apathy, since an Israeli citizen needs to be in Israel in order to vote. And needs to go to the poll to vote. This year, some 60,000 Israelis living abroad spent upwards of $5,000 in travel expenses, per person, just to get to Israel to vote. That’s patriotism!
In the UK, reporting on an election is forbidden on election day. This prevents the obviously unwise American media habit of reporting on election results in the East while polls are still open in the West — an unnecessary and potential corruption of the voting process in the West (“if my guy, or my party, is going to lose anyway, why vote?).
A similar distortion: the ubiquity of polls. They too can discourage voting if one’s favored candidate seems to have little or no chance of winning. In addition, polling can build distrust in the electoral process. Witness Israel’s recent election. Poll after poll showed Netanyahu trailing Eisenkot. But Netanyahu outscored Eisenkot.
We also can discern no positive purpose for media to report on how many people — and which party — vote “early,” in advance of and on election day.
The contents of many ballot issues across the country implicitly undercut the idea that the US is designed to be a republic, not a pure democracy. Case in point: the large number of issues that appeared on the Colorado ballot this year as Constitutional Amendments. Without discussing the merits or demerits of any particular amendment, why so many? Many amendments would replace the work of our republic — the legislature and the courts.
In the US, the idea has gained currency that the spread of mail balloting has enhanced democracy. Just the opposite. When people must go to the polls, wait in line with fellow citizens, a camaraderie is built. That is lost in the mail-ballot system. As for the argument that not everyone can take off from work to vote, then adopt the Israeli system. Make federation election day a federal holiday.
It was a lost opportunity not to do so when Juneteenth was made a federal holiday. To be sure, the end of slavery in the last remaining Confederate state — Texas — is a milestone to be celebrated. But it already is, on Martin Luther King Day. It would have been a wiser use of limited public holidays to turn each election day into a public holiday. Talk about focusing on civil rights! There is none greater than the right to vote.
Worst of all: the obscene amounts spent on elections. This round, Elon Musk: $445.6 million. Michael Bloomberg: $84.8 million. Reid Hoffman: $41.8 million. Etc. Nuff said.
© IJN 2026
