Vice President JD Vance voted by mail in this week’s general election in Cincinnati, Ohio, even as President Donald Trump continues to call for an end to mail-in voting, insisting it leads to widespread fraud.
Vance’s half-brother, Cory Bowman, a Republican, lost his long-shot bid for Cincinnati mayor to incumbent Aftab Pureval, a Democrat who won reelection in a landslide.
According to public voting records, Vance submitted an absentee ballot, which indicates he voted either early or by mail. After a public records request, the Hamilton County Board of Elections confirmed that Vance voted by mail in the Tuesday, Nov. 4, general election.
In Ohio, voters must request an absentee ballot no later than seven days before the election in which they intend to vote.
Vance’s spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday, Nov. 7.
Despite Vance’s use of mail-in voting, Trump has continued to condemn the practice. Even before election results were released, he criticized mail-in ballots, repeating his claims that they compromise election integrity. Democrats, meanwhile, saw strong results during the first major election day since Trump’s reelection, securing high-profile gubernatorial victories in New Jersey and Virginia, the only two states electing new governors this year.
In New York City, Zohran Mamdani, a 34-year-old self-described democratic socialist, was elected the city’s next mayor amid the country’s ongoing government shutdown.
The Brennan Center for Justice, a nonpartisan law and policy institute, notes that mail ballots have been used successfully in the U.S. for more than 150 years and that instances of mail ballot fraud are extremely rare.
The U.S. Postal Service processed over 99.2 million mail-in ballots in 2024, underscoring the method’s continued popularity among voters.
Still, Trump has repeatedly called for its elimination—except for limited cases involving military personnel or voters with serious illnesses.
At a Nov. 6 press conference, when asked if Republicans in Congress should compromise with Democrats to restart negotiations during the shutdown, Trump again urged GOP lawmakers to end the filibuster—a proposal many Republicans have resisted, warning it could later empower Democrats when they regain control.
“Vote with voter ID,” Trump said. “No mail-in voting, except for military far away and people who are very sick.”
He added, “I’d like to see one-day voting. Not 65 days of voting from all over the place.”
Earlier this year, Trump pledged to end mail-in voting before the 2026 midterm elections.
At an October 2024 campaign event in Pittsburgh, Vance was asked how he reconciles Trump’s stance on mail-in voting with his own decision to use the method.
He responded that while he doesn’t personally favor mail-in ballots, they are a current reality of the voting system:
“Mail-in voting is now here, so let’s deal with that reality and make sure our voices count just as much as the other side.”
