Share
News

Election Day 2023: Officials Say Voting Machine Glitch Is Changing Some Votes

Share

As Americans in several states went to the polls on Tuesday, a county in eastern Pennsylvania reported one of the most troubling issues any voter could worry about.

A vote cast on whether to keep a sitting judge on the state’s Superior Court would be recorded for another judge on the ballot, according to the Allentown Morning Call.

County officials decided to use provisional ballots briefly until a judge decided the flipped votes could be taken into account in the postelection canvassing process, another news outlet reported.

Officials in Northampton County, north of Philadelphia, posted a Facebook message about the problem.

The problem affected judicial retention races on the court, which is one step below the state Supreme Court.

On the ballot are Judges Jack Panella, a Democrat, and Victor P. Stabile, a Republican.

In its Facebook post, Northampton County said, “It appears that when a voter selects a ‘Yes’ or a ‘No’ for one of the candidates for retention to the Pennsylvania Superior Court, the selection is recorded on the paper ballot and on the machine for the other candidate.”

The post stressed that the judicial retention race was the only one where the issue arose. Also, the problem appeared only if a voter wished to retain one of the judges but not the other.

Do you trust voting machines?

“The issue is limited to the retention of Superior Court judges and is only an issue when recording the votes for when a voter selected a ‘Yes’ for one candidate and a ‘No’ for another,” the Facebook post said.

Poll workers were instructed by text message to notify voters about the problem, according to the post.

According to LehighValleyNews.com, machines were taken offline and voters received provisional ballots for about an hour. However, once Northampton County determined that the problem affected only one race and that it was affecting that race on machines throughout the county, poll workers were notified by text to restart the machines and notify voters of the problem.

“The uniformity also means it can be corrected: When the votes are officially canvassed over the next several days, canvassers can assign votes for retention recorded on the voting machines, essentially reversing the flipped votes to ‘reflect the intent of the voter,’” according to a court filing reported by the website.

According to LehighValleyNews.com, the chairman of the Northampton County Republican Committee, Glenn Geissinger, said the party would appeal that decision.

Related:
Election Judge Charged with Felonies After Auditor Flags a Major Problem

The county’s Facebook page limited the ability of users to comment on its post.

But at a time when election integrity is in the national spotlight, the news got attention on social media from across the country.

In Arizona, Abe Hamadeh, a Republican former attorney general candidate and current congressional contender, posted a mocking note to the social media platform X:

Northampton County’s chief executive, Lamont McClure said he was “livid” at the problems at the polls, LehighValleyNews.com reported.


A Note from Our Staff:

Did you know that 90 percent of advertisers will have nothing to do with The Western Journal? The liberal elites have put us on one of their financial kill lists.

They did it because we’ve told the truth and spoken out against them for over a decade. And since they couldn’t shut us up, now, they’re trying to starve us out.

We’re turning to you because, frankly, we have to have your help. It might not sound like much, but just one membership to The Western Journal can make a real difference.

We don’t have a huge staff, big salaries, or deep donor pockets. We’re family-owned and independent. But because we're independent from the elites, we have to rely on readers like you.

Can we count on you for just a single membership? The cost of a month-long membership is less than a single cup of Starbucks coffee. And, unlike with Starbucks, you can be 100 percent certain that every penny we spend goes toward fighting for traditional American values and against liberal elites.

Please help us continue exposing the truth. Please join today.

Thank you for reading The Western Journal!

Truth and Accuracy

Submit a Correction →



We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.

Tags:
, , , , ,
Share
Joe has spent more than 30 years as a reporter, copy editor and metro desk editor in newsrooms in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Florida. He's been with Liftable Media since 2015.
Joe has spent more than 30 years as a reporter, copy editor and metro editor in newsrooms in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Florida. He's been with Liftable Media since 2015. Largely a product of Catholic schools, who discovered Ayn Rand in college, Joe is a lifelong newspaperman who learned enough about the trade to be skeptical of every word ever written. He was also lucky enough to have a job that didn't need a printing press to do it.
Birthplace
Philadelphia
Nationality
American




Advertise with The Western Journal and reach millions of highly engaged readers, while supporting our work. Advertise Today.

Conversation