Utah's lieutenant governor has ordered an emergency Election Day accommodation that lets flood-blocked voters in San Juan County, in the state's remote southeast, receive and return their ballots electronically — a system normally reserved for military and overseas voters. Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson issued the Declaration of Emergency Election Accommodations on Monday evening, November 2, for San Juan County voters who have not yet voted and who cannot reasonably travel to a polling place or a ballot drop box on Tuesday, November 3, because of the recent flooding, her office announced. 'We want every eligible voter in San Juan County to be able to cast a ballot,' Henderson said.

Source: Gephardt Daily, Utah (Nov. 2, 2026)

How the electronic ballot works — and who qualifies

The accommodation is narrow on purpose: it covers only San Juan County voters who have not yet voted in this election and who cannot reasonably travel to a drop box or an in-person polling location on Election Day because of flood conditions. Voters who have an email address in their voter record and have not yet voted were to receive an email on the morning of Election Day with their ballot, sent through the same electronic system that UOCAVA — military and overseas — voters already use. Voters who do not receive an email can call the San Juan County Clerk before 5 p.m. on Election Day to request the accommodation and have a ballot emailed to them. Henderson's office strongly encouraged voters to request early in the day: requests received after 5 p.m. will not be accepted, and every electronic ballot must be submitted no later than 8 p.m. on Tuesday, November 3.

Source: Utah Lieutenant Governor's Office release, via Gephardt Daily and Stewardship Utah

Why San Juan County needed it: a week of flooding in Utah's vast southeast

The declaration describes flooding that has had a huge impact on the county for the past week — threatening lives, homes, businesses and public infrastructure, and causing severe damage to roadways and utilities that has left some roads unusable. San Juan County covers a vast geographic area in southeastern Utah, including red-rock desert, the towns of Monticello, Blanding and Bluff and communities of the Navajo Nation, and reaching a polling place or drop box there can mean travelling extensive distances even in good weather; with flood damage and emergency conditions, the lieutenant governor's office said, access to polling places and drop boxes has become extremely difficult or impossible for some voters. Election administrators serving the Navajo Nation also announced changes to several of its polling locations because of the flooding, the Associated Press reported.

Source: Utah Lieutenant Governor's Office; Associated Press (Nov. 3, 2026)

The same storm, one state over: Colorado's emergency ballots

Utah was not improvising alone. In neighbouring Colorado, the Secretary of State's office said a voting center and a ballot drop box in Pagosa Springs had been relocated ahead of Election Day because of the same Southwest flooding, and flood-affected voters in La Plata and Archuleta counties can request an emergency ballot online or pick up a replacement ballot at any voter service center in the state — a full home-county ballot inside their own county, statewide races only outside it — with ballots due back by 7 p.m. Colorado time. In Pagosa Springs, the San Juan River reached 16.81 feet on Sunday, about a foot below the level that nearly wiped out the town in 1911, and Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs declared a statewide emergency on Monday as the storm system pushed east across the Southwest.

Source: CNN (Nov. 2, 2026)

Background: why electronic return is exceptional

Utah votes mostly by mail, and ballots are normally returned by drop box, by post, or in person — not over the internet. Electronic delivery and return is ordinarily reserved for UOCAVA voters: service members, their families and citizens living overseas, for whom distance is the whole point of the exception. Extending that channel to domestic voters inside Utah required a formal emergency declaration by the lieutenant governor, who is the state's chief election officer, and the order is written to expire with this election: it applies only to this specific group of voters, in this county, on this Election Day. The approach also has a practical limit officials have not hidden — an emailed ballot helps only a voter who still has power, a charged phone and an internet or mobile connection in a flooded county.

Source: Utah Lieutenant Governor's Office release, via Stewardship Utah

What happens next

The deadlines are tonight. San Juan County voters who need the accommodation must request it from the county clerk by 5 p.m. Mountain time, and electronic ballots must be submitted by 8 p.m., when Utah polls close. Drop boxes at the county's listed locations close earlier, at 3 p.m., while in-person polling places stay open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Ballots properly submitted under the emergency order will be counted with the rest of San Juan County's vote in the midterm elections, which decide control of Congress as well as Utah state and local offices. Voters unsure whether they qualify should contact the San Juan County Clerk's office as early in the day as possible — after 5 p.m., the electronic option is gone.

Source: Gephardt Daily, Utah (Nov. 2, 2026)