Clay County Election Results in Question
/The results of the August 4th Clay County primary election are now in serious question due to errors spotted by Jon Carpenter, Democratic candidate for Western Commissioner. Carpenter noticed potential errors when the detailed review published by the Clay County Board of Election Commissioners showed that he received zero votes in certain precincts.
A recount will being on Thursday, August 6th at 1:00pm
The Election Commissioners review shows that Carpenter’s opponent, Cathy Rinehart, received 100% of the votes in the majority of reporting precincts. When Carpenter called the Election Commissioners office, they acknowledged that errors had occurred in multiple races.
“When they [Election Commissioners] released the precinct by precinct results, and over half of the precincts had me getting zero votes, and my opponent getting 100% of the votes, we knew that was incorrect,” said Carpenter. “It’s been brought to their attention and at this point, my understanding is that that maybe there was some problem with software with the voting machines.”
“We are aware there was a problem during our verification process,” stated Patti Lamb of the Board of Election Commissioners. “We discovered these discrepancies in our unofficial election results.” Lamb believes that there was a programming error in the tabulators that affected some of the races. The vendor used by the Board of Election Commissioners is still investigating the cause of the error.
The vendor Lamb is referring to is Adkins Printing. The Board, along with Adkins Printing, will be conducting a recount at 1:00pm on Thursday, August 6th . “All election results now are unofficial until we have completed our verification process,” stated Lamb.
Carpenter is hopeful that the people of Clay County will have accurate numbers after the recount tomorrow.
Lamb stated the Clay County Board of Election Commissioners will release official results after the verification process has been concluded, which is projected to be next week.
KPGZ News - Brian Watts contributed to this story
