Some polling stations encountered vote-delaying technical issues that officials characterized as minor.
A limited number of polling locations across the United States reported technical difficulties with ballot casting during the midterm elections, prompting election officials to extend polling hours so voters could cast their ballots.
In Westchester County, New York, just north of New York City, officials said ballot-scanning machines designed to automatically read paper ballots malfunctioned because the ballot paper stock was too thick.
Al Jazeera’s Kristen Saloomey, reporting from Tarrytown, New York, said election workers were collecting affected ballots for later manual counting. The machines are manufactured by Liberty Vote, a firm previously known as Dominion. Dominion has faced unsubstantiated allegations from former U.S. President Donald Trump regarding vote-count irregularities in prior elections.
“Election officials are reassuring voters that these ballots will be counted manually once processing is complete,” Saloomey said. “We are not aware of this issue affecting other districts in New York or elsewhere in the country, although dozens of jurisdictions use this system.”
Officials in Westchester County said on Tuesday that ballots would be transported to the Board of Elections under police escort and counted there with attorneys and party representatives present, a measure intended to prevent the spread of conspiracy theories.
Other jurisdictions also experienced voting delays due to technical problems.
In Broward County, Florida, voting was delayed by 20 minutes at the start of the day after a newly installed safety feature malfunctioned.
In North Carolina, the State Board of Elections is considering extending voting by one hour in seven counties following widespread reports of “technical issues.”
In Arizona’s Maricopa County, a polling station located at a school temporarily closed after a power outage.
In several Pennsylvania counties, voting was extended by 30 minutes because of what officials described as “machine setup issues.”
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