Issues started to arise at polling places in and around Jackson shortly after the polls opened at 7:00 A.M. In some instances, voters were turned away from the polls because they didn’t open on time. In one precinct, three of the biggest races were left off of the ballots.
There’s a significant issue for voters voting at the Wynndale Presbyterian church in Byram. “Our chief problem right now is that we had two races left off the machine, the Sheriff’s race and the Governor’s race on the Democratic machine,” says Virginia Terry, a Democratic Receiving and Returning Manager.
The ballots on the Republican ballot weren’t correct either. The Lieutenant Governor and Governor were left off that ballot. Election officials say the ballots were checked numerous times prior to the primary, but something obviously went very wrong. Terry says, “that’s how the machines came from the courthouse that’s how we got them from the courthouse they were already here when we got here so whatever problem it was we don’t know if it was in transition.”
Technicians have to fix the problem. In order to correct the ballots the voting machines have to be re-programmed. While the machines are down, Terry says, “what we’re doing is using paper ballots and they will be counted at the end of the day.”
There’s also another concern. State Representative Jim Ellington (R) says numerous voters were given paper ballots for a different district. Ellington says, “we had two different paper ballots, one was correct district 73, one was not.”
That discrepancy could cause some problems when it’s time to count the votes. “About 70 people were allowed to vote and it was the wrong ballot first and so they corrected the problem now, but now we’ve got 70 votes in dispute,” says Ellington. Election officials aren’t sure when the electronic ballots will be fixed.
Source: Major races left off ballots – WLBT 3 – Jackson, MS:.