One Ballot Is Still Crossing the Atlantic: Pope Leo XIV's Illinois Vote Must Be Postmarked by Tuesday to Count
The Vatican says the Chicago-born pope has submitted his mail-in ballot for the midterms — a first for a sitting pontiff. As of late last week, Will County officials in Joliet had not yet received it.
Somewhere between Vatican City and Joliet, one of the most unusual ballots of the 2026 midterms is making its way home. The Holy See Press Office confirmed on Friday that Pope Leo XIV — born Robert Francis Prevost in Chicago — has submitted a mail-in ballot in Illinois, exercising, in the Vatican's words, his right to vote as a United States citizen, as he has done whenever he was eligible to do so. He is the first sitting pope known to vote in a U.S. election.
The paper trail runs through Will County. Kim Fladhammer, chief of staff for the Will County clerk's office, confirmed that the pope — registered at a New Lenox address under his birth name — requested a mail-in ballot on October 3. As of Thursday, the clerk's office had not yet received a completed ballot; the return trip runs from Vatican City to the clerk's office in Joliet. The Chicago Sun-Times first reported the vote.
The rules now are the same ones that govern every Illinois mail ballot: to count, it must be postmarked by Election Day, Tuesday, November 3, and reach election officials by November 17. What is on his ballot is the same Illinois slate Chicago voters are deciding — Gov. JB Pritzker's bid for a third term and the contest to succeed retiring Sen. Dick Durbin among them. How he voted is secret, and the Vatican has shared nothing about his choices.
Leo, elected in May 2025 as the first American pope, kept his U.S. citizenship. Illinois does not register voters by party, and nothing in the public record documents an affiliation for him. His participation will appear in public voter records once the ballot is received and counted; his selections will not.
