Here’s how the stranded astronauts will vote from space | Space

But they’ll still be able to exercise their right to vote, and they plan to.

“I sent down my request for a ballot today,” one of the astronauts, Butch Wilmore, said to reporters Friday. “It’s a very important role that we play as citizens including those elections, and NASA makes it very easy for us to do that.”

Sunita Williams, the other astronaut, agreed with Wilmore’s statement.

“It’s a very important duty that we have as citizens and looking forward to being able to vote from space, which is pretty cool,” she said.

So how will they vote from outer space?

While they didn’t offer any specifics as to who they will vote for, the process of how they will vote varies from the norm. They don’t have any physical polling stations, and won’t mail in their ballots either, so instead, they vote on a secure PDF file provided to them electronically by election officials in Texas.

“Before sending the astronauts their ballot, it is transferred to a fillable document so that they can make their selections, save it, and send it back. A test ballot with a unique password is always sent first. Once they vote on their live ballot, it is returned, printed, and processed…