Shelby County Democratic Party chairman Bryan Carson said Thursday he will ask for federal monitors to oversee the county election after a glitch that he claimed caused problems for early voters during the day. But Election Commission chairman Robert Meyers said the problem should not have impacted votes being cast. Meyers said a construction crew dropped a load of rocks over ground near the early voting location at the Agricenter that was on top of a fiber-optic line. The line was used for precincts to access the registration database when voters check in, he said, and the glitch impacted more than just the Agricenter site. “That’s really kind of a back-of-the-house operation,” Meyers said. And that’s separate from the actual voting machines, which store votes on memory cards.
Meyers said the only impact was that the sign-in process for some voters may have taken slightly longer than normal. The Election Commission registered voters through a backup method.
Carson, who was joined by Democratic sheriff nominee Bennie Cobb in a news conference the party called Downtown, alleged that “a lot” of voters were asked to use absentee ballots to cast their votes.
But the Election Commission said its office received no reports from polling places that absentee ballots were used Thursday.
Full Article: Shelby County Democrats call for federal monitors; Election Commission chair says glitch didn’t – The Commercial Appeal.