So you signed, sealed, delivered your absentee ballot. What happens to it next?

Michigan clerks are experiencing a veritable tidal wave of absentee ballots this election season. 

"More people [are] voting absentee this year than ever before," Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said Wednesday. "We're on track to see this record-breaking turnout under extraordinary circumstances, with a pandemic."

Already, about twice as many Michigan voters have submitted absentee ballots for Tuesday's election than did in the 2016 presidential general election. About 2.4 million have submitted them this year compared to 1.27 million four years ago.

Lots of those voters are submitting absentee ballots for the first time, since it's easier to avoid coronavirus transmission by voting absentee than in-person, and a ballot measure passed in 2018 expanded no-reason absentee voting in Michigan, so it's accessible to all voters.  

Those voters want to know more. Many of the readers who submitted questions to the State Journal's Election Q&A series asked about absentee voting, especially about what happens to ballots once they reach the clerk.

We reached out to Delta Township Clerk Mary Clark to find out what happens. Check out the video at the top of this story to watch her walk us through the process.

How your absentee ballot becomes a vote

Step one: Your clerk accepts and verifies your absentee ballot

Voters send their absentee ballots to clerks through the mail, place them in a drop box or take them directly to the clerk's office. 

When a clerk gets a ballot, they write the voter's precinct number and ballot number on the envelope. That helps them sort it later on.

Then, they write down when it was received, scan it into the Secretary of State's computer system and make sure the signature on the return envelope matches the one on file with the state. They alert the voter if a signature is missing or doesn't match, giving the voter a chance to re-do it. 

Not sure if your signatures line up? Learn more about that here.

If the signature passes muster, the clerk will sort the ballot by precinct and place it in a locked room. The ballots remain in their return envelopes. 

Step two: Processing begins for some jurisdictions

Jurisdictions with more than 25,000 people get to process absentee ballots from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. on the Monday before Election Day, thanks to a bipartisan bill Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed Oct. 6.

They can't tally results yet. (We'll get to that part in the next section.)

On Monday, those jurisdictions' absent voter counting boards meet to "process" ballots, or get them ready for tabulating.

They start by counting ballots to make sure the number they have in storage matches the number in the clerk's records.

Then, they open the return envelopes and take ballots out, keeping them in their secrecy sleeves. They also make sure the number on the top of a person's ballot matches the number on the ballot sent to that voter.

Then, the ballots are placed in metal boxes that are sealed with a state-provided seal. Election workers write down the unique number on those seals, then store the boxes in a locked room.

Step three: Counting the votes

Absent voter counting boards meet on Election Day to count votes.

Smaller jurisdictions do step two and three on Election Day. 

The larger ones that processed absentee ballots on Monday start Election Day by checking to make sure the metal boxes where ballots were stored overnight are still sealed with the same seal used the night before.

Then, they open the boxes, remove the ballots and count them to make sure the number inside matches the number placed there the night before. 

After that, election workers remove ballots from their secrecy sleeves, remove the stub from the top of the ballot and run them through the tabulator. 

"And we'll do that 11,000 times," Clark said. "Or 12,000, or 13,000."

They also will get new batches of absentee ballots throughout the day. Absentee ballots must be returned by the time polls close, 8 p.m. Tuesday, but election workers will keep working until they're done tabulating. 

Small jurisdictions, like Onondaga Township, don't have absent voter counting boards, Ingham County Clerk Barb Byrum said. Instead, their election workers process and tabulate absentee ballots at polling places when there's a lull between in-person voters. 

It's not over when results are tabulated

Each county has a bipartisan board of canvassers that meets after Election Day to review results from local jurisdictions. They make sure the number of votes cast at each precinct adds up to the total number of votes that jurisdiction reported and check that election workers followed procedures written by the state Board of Elections. 

They have until Nov. 17 to certify results, Byrum said. 

Boards of canvassers also are in charge of election recounts, resolving issues with faulty ballots or equipment and inspecting ballot containers, according to a state manual. 

Michigan's Board of State Canvassers, also a bipartisan group, will meet to certify statewide elections, judicial elections and legislative elections for districts that cross county lines.

The state-level board also conducts recounts for state-level offices, reviews petitions and ballot proposals and approves electronic voting systems.

Contact Carol Thompson at ckthompson@lsj.com. Follow her on Twitter @thompsoncarolk.