A month after Election Day, it’s still not completely clear why York County incorrectly programmed more than 600 voting machines – risking the integrity of nearly 60,000 ballots. But a post-mortem report demanded by the Pennsylvania Department of State shed some light on how the mistake occurred and what might prevent it going forward. The Department of State isn’t going to respond to the county’s report and self-assessment, nor comment on it, according to a spokeswoman, beyond its emailed. But it did release the post-mortem report submitted last week by York County. One challenge averted, but do others await?
As it turned out, there were 2,900 double votes cast in nine races. And, although officials initially claimed no races were affected, the numbers indicated it was, in fact, mathematically possible after all for one race to be impacted: West York Borough Council.
Four seats were up, and Councilwoman Shelley Metzler finished fifth. She might have secured fourth-place – and another term – if she’d received enough of the double votes cast for other candidates.
Normally, you can’t vote twice for a candidate on one ballot. But the programming error made it possible in 20 races in York – nine of which were contested – one month ago. One was countywide, for Court of Common Pleas judge, which is why tens of thousands of ballots could’ve been impacted.
Full Article: York County plans changes to election process after confusion at the polls | News | witf.org.