Some counties in Ohio reported temporary delays in submitting ballots as the state held primary elections, citing technical problems with electronic poll books early Tuesday morning.
Electronic poll books, which record voter registration information but do not count votes, in Cuyahoga County and Lucas County experienced similar problems, as scanning issues and technical glitches slowed the process for voters to cast their ballots. However, officials in both counties insisted the problems were resolved and would not lead to incorrect results or uncounted ballots.
In Cuyahoga County, poll workers experienced problems with the electronic poll books, which act as an online roster to ensure voters are properly registered within the district or precinct they are attempting to submit their ballots for, according to Cleveland.com. The machines are meant to scan the stub numbers on voters’ ballots automatically to check them in and record they had voted.
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However, poll workers had to look up voters manually and log the stub numbers by hand, according to the report. Some voters did leave before casting a ballot, but officials said no one was turned away and stressed everyone could be confident their vote would be counted accurately.
“Recording stub numbers is just a function of the board being able to reconcile the election and keep track of how many ballots were issued and how many ballots were voted, so really it’s just an internal function that in no way affected the way people voted or any other part of the voting process,” Cuyahoga County Board of Elections spokesman Mike West told the outlet.
Everything was resolved shortly before 8 a.m. on Tuesday, and more than 9,000 people had voted by the time it was 9 a.m., according to West. It’s unclear how many of those votes were recorded by hand.
In Lucas County, electronic poll books misprinted bar codes that are meant to indicate to which party someone is choosing to dedicate a vote. When voters inserted their ballot into the voting machine, the opposite party would appear, according to ABC 13. Voters who received incorrect bar codes were instructed to create a new one on the voting machines before submitting their ballots.
County officials stressed to the Washington Examiner the error with poll books would not lead to miscounted votes.
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“The poll workers were made aware of this issue and immediately followed correct backup procedures,” a spokesperson for the Lucas County Board of Election said. “The vendor is working on correcting this error. … Voters should feel safe that these backup procedures will correctly record their vote. Voters who have concerns can always ask for a paper ballot to cast their ballot.”
The county later issued a statement Tuesday afternoon that the problem had been resolved.
Voters went to the polls Tuesday in races across Indiana and Ohio that will offer some of the first signs of how the midterm elections will play out. In particular, Ohio’s Republican Senate primary will provide the clearest test yet of former President Donald Trump’s influence in electoral politics now that he’s out of power and making a series of endorsements.