HARRISBURG — You may call them mail-in ballots, but in Pennsylvania there is more than one way to return them.

In many counties across the Commonwealth, voters have the option to drop their completed mail-in ballots into secure mailboxes. This will allow Pennsylvanians to ensure ballots are received at county election offices before the 8:00 p.m. Election Day deadline without risking postal delays.

Still, some public figures, including former President Donald Trump, have tried to ban mailboxes, saying they are not allowed under state law and are vulnerable to fraud.

In fact, both state and federal courts have upheld their use. And while critics point to incidents where people appear to have cast more than one ballot — something not allowed under state law — there is no evidence of widespread fraud. Here's what you need to know:

Are ballot drop boxes legal in Pennsylvania?

Counties began widespread adoption of the ballot return tool in 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic discouraged people from gathering indoors and the Postal Service suffered delays.

However, mailboxes are not explicitly mentioned in the state election law, making them vulnerable to legal and political attacks.

Before the November 2020 election, Trump's campaign filed a lawsuit in federal court seeking a ban on mailboxes, saying they were unconstitutional and citing security concerns. Democratic elected officials also filed a petition in state court asking, among other things, the justices to confirm whether drop boxes are legal.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that they were permissible, and then-Justice Max Baer wrote that the majority's decision was based on “the clear legislative intent underlying Act 77 (Pennsylvania's mail-in voting law) … to provide voters the opportunity to to vote outside of traditional polling stations.”

A federal judge then issued a similar ruling, dismissing Trump's lawsuit. The judge said that the campaign's fraud concerns were “speculative” and that “the job of an unelected federal judge is not to propose election improvements, particularly when those improvements contradict the reasoned judgment of democratically elected officials.”

Since then, there have been isolated actions around the mailboxes. The Republican-controlled state Senate passed a bill in 2022 that would have banned them, but it failed to gain traction in the state House of Representatives. And in October of this year, the ACLU of Pennsylvania sued on behalf of voters after a Luzerne County official unilaterally decided to remove the county's mailboxes. The district official eventually changed course.

Are there postal ballot boxes in my district?

Thirty-four counties in Pennsylvania have at least one mailbox, while 33 do not. You can check if there are any in your county at vote.pa.

While the Pennsylvania legislature and governor have not banned mailboxes, they have not officially enshrined their use in state law. This means that mailboxes are allowed but not required, so their use varies across states.

Some counties, such as Delaware and Philadelphia, have numerous drop boxes as well as satellite election offices. These locations function like the county's main election office, allowing voters to request mail-in ballots, get advice on filling them out and drop them off in one location.

Other counties, like Lancaster, reject ballot drop boxes entirely. If voters in such counties want to cast their absentee ballots in person, their only option is to go to the county election office during business hours.