In the last election, some votes in South Carolina got counted twice. Others were credited to the wrong candidate. Also, one observer thinks, the state’s 14-year-old voting machines are starting to show their age, producing other errors. Those are some of the conclusions in a report released last week by the League of Women Voters of South Carolina. On Jan. 22, the league will host a public forum at the Richland County Public Library on ways to improve the state’s election system. The group is backing efforts in the S.C. Legislature to require a paper ballot system. “Over the years, they’ve made upgrades, and it’s still flawed,” Lynn Teague, vice president of the league, said of the state’s existing voting system. “They’re still counting votes wrong … and all this without someone deliberately trying to mess with the system.”
Both the report’s author and the League of Women Voters praise the state Election Commission for making all of its 2018 election data publicly available.
“South Carolina has a lot more transparency,” said Teague. “That’s why we know what happened here.”
The Election Commission doesn’t dispute the errors reported. But, it says, most of the problems cited are the result of human error, not problems with the election system.
Full Article: SC voting machine problems detailed in 2018 election report | The State.