Frustrated by long voting lines? Imagine being stuck hundreds of miles above the Earth and needing to cast your ballot.

That’s the reality U.S. astronauts find themselves in. Currently, four Americans are orbiting the Earth, including SpaceX astronaut Nick Hague, NASA astronaut Don Pettit, and stranded Boeing Starliner astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams.

Despite being 250 miles above the nearest polling place, the U.S. astronauts aboard the International Space Station are voting from space by using NASA's Space Communication and Navigation (SCaN) network, which allows astronauts to transmit their encrypted votes back to Earth securely.

“The Near Space Network allows astronauts on the International Space Station to take part in the democratic voting process and ensure their voices are heard,” deputy associate administrator for SCaN, Kevin Coggins, told Decrypt in a statement.

NASA said that Williams, Wilmore, Hague, and Pettit have indicated they plan to vote, but when they do is their decision.

“It is up to the crew members to disclose whether they have voted,” a NASA spokesperson told Decrypt, adding that “Wilmore stated Tuesday morning he had voted early.”

Once completed aboard the ISS, the electronic ballot is securely transmitted via NASA’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System to a ground antenna at the White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico.

It is then sent to Mission Control at Johnson Space Center and forwarded to the astronauts’ appropriate county clerk for casting. The ballot is encrypted, ensuring only the astronaut and the clerk have access.

Despite being stranded on the International Space Station since June, Wilmore was adamant about voting in the 2024 elections.

"It's a very important role that we all play as citizens, to be included in those elections, and NASA makes it very easy for us to do that," Wilmore said during a press conference in September.

Voting from space is not new and dates back to the late 1990s. Texas became the first U.S. state to legalize voting from orbit in 1997, and astronaut David Wolf became the first American to vote from space that year, followed by Kate Rubins in 2020.

Beyond enabling astronauts to participate in elections, SCaN manages various essential communication networks for NASA, including the Deep Space Network, Near Earth Network, and Space Network.

According to NASA, the Space Communication and Navigation network connects missions within 1.2 million miles of Earth, far enough to reach Mars, around 92 million miles away. These networks not only support astronauts but also play a critical role in advancing NASA’s broader missions.

“NASA's Space Communication and Navigation space communication networks are key to bringing down science and exploration data, and our program also plays an essential role in connecting astronauts to their families, the agency’s Mission Control Center, and more,” Coggins said.

NASA is also looking to extend its communication capabilities even further into deep space, having launched the Deep Space Optical Communication (DSOC) project, which uses lasers to send data as far as 2.2 billion miles away.

While NASA continues to develop advanced communication methods for deep space, the same technology that helps astronauts connect with Earth allows them to perform one of the most important civic duties—voting, no matter where they are in the universe.

Edited by Josh Quittner and Sebastian Sinclair

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