Washingtonpost.com:
Fairfax County election officials said Friday that they believe nearly 2,000 votes went uncounted after Tuesday’s elections, a technical error that could affect the outcome of the still unresolved race for Virginia attorney general.
The error stemmed from problems with a broken machine at the county’s Mason district voting center, officials said.
The machine, known as an optical scanner, recorded 723 votes on election night before it broke down, election officials said. Its memory card was then placed in a working machine, which recorded 2,688 votes.
But that tally was not included in the statement of election results delivered by the Mason voting center to the county election board. Instead, officials received a statement that reported the 723 votes from the broken machine.
Election officials believe that the larger total includes the 723 votes, which could mean adding 1,965 votes to the outcome, said Seth T. Stark, chairman of the three-member electoral board.
But with Democrats looking for more votes, Republicans trying to protect the interests of their candidate and volunteers exhausted after three days of auditing totals, the board held off on making a change to the tally, officials said.
The extra votes, which come from an area that leans heavily in favor of Democrats, could affect the outcome of the attorney general’s race, which appears headed for a recount. As of Friday afternoon, state Sen. Mark D. Obenshain (R-Harrisonburg) was leading state Sen. Mark R. Herring (D-Loudoun) by 1,272 votes, or about 0.06 percent of the 2.2 million votes cast, according to the State Board of Elections’ Web site.
The margin changed slightly after officials in Bedford County, near Roanoke, said Friday that they had also discovered missing votes.
Barbara Gunter, Bedford’s general registrar, said 732 votes were overlooked in the preliminary results because of human error or technical problems. After canvassing the totals, the county reported Friday that Obenshain had received 581 additional votes and that Herring had received an additional 150 votes.
This is nuts! Totally nuts! Over 40 years ago we put men on the moon. It was done mainly with computers and data cards. Now we can’t even get computers to count a few thousand votes? The entire space program must have been a miracle. Perhaps we would be better off just going back to paper ballots and counting the damn things by hand. It would probably be more accurate.
How was the discrepancy discovered? According to the WaPo:
In the 10th District, 88 percent of voters who requested a ballot also voted, and 86 percent did so in the 11th District. But in the 8th District, only 50 percent of those who requested ballots — 4,168 out of 8,363 — appeared to have cast ballots, a response rate not only lower than in other parts of Fairfax County but also lower than in any other congressional district in the state, according to the Connolly team.
The Connolly team noticed the stark difference in cast ballots, compared to the percent of returns in the other two districts. Congressman Jim Moran represents the 8th district. Regardless of the outcome, probably Obenshain or Herring will request a recount.
Should we return to hand cast ballots? How do we avoid a Florida situation any time a vote is close? Someone will always feel cheated.
I don’t know if it is time to drag out the conspiracy theory but it sure is beginning to look like it might be necessary.
This is just ridiculous. Why don’t we have this down to a science by now? Why aren’t these machines tested and maintained properly? 2,688 votes vs. 723. How could anyone trust the votes that get counted from that machine?
Exactly. @Emma. They should be tested and properly maintained.
Also, an investigation over the long lines turned up a bunch of lip service with the fox guarding the hen house.
What is this rumor I keep hearing about them doing away with the current voting machines? What will be used in their place?
Where to start – low bid, understaffed, cheap technology, infrequent use (importance not as big an issue)……money for schools, public safety.
I agree but from the inside dwindling tax dollars are going to schools and public safety. Gov’t officials just hunker down and hold their breath through elections and pray like mad for another jurisdiction to have worse problems.
That would be more fun.
I heard we were going to have new voting machines with real paper trails. This is rididulous.
Go back and look at the history of electronic voting in VA. It’s ridiculous. I’ll never forget the chair of our electoral board presenting his report to the Council and saying “we have a couple of older electronic voting machines that are having hardware problems that should be replaced”…and he kept on rolling. I stopped him and asked the obvious “well, why don’t we buy more”? His reply? “It’s illegal”. I’m struggling to recall the details but I think the GA, after allowing electronic voting then outlawed it b/c of the paper trail thing and have been unable to reach consensus ever since. Although that might a little off but it does explain why they are still using optical scanners….
It seems to be that the situation is getting critical. How do we ever know if we have even voted?
Great question Moon!!!!
55 vote difference. Obenshain is still ahead. The provisional ballots are next. I think I read that those voters had to show up in person.
now its a 17 vote difference. Obenshain leads.
Talk about every vote counting!
What else can one expect from such a partisan electoral board up in Fairfax? Hans Von Spakovsky was recently not reappointed. Hans is the Heritage Foundation push behind voter id maneuvers – http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/10/29/121029fa_fact_mayer I do not know his replacement but he is another partisan GOP former Bush appointee.