Dallas Elections Administrator Questions Missing Ballots, Awaiting Judge's Decision
DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) - The decision whether to reopen the Super Tuesday election results in Dallas County will lie in the hands of a district judge. Those results are in question after the Elections Administrator noticed that some ballots were missing.
After the polls closed on Super Tuesday in Dallas County, election officials noticed a discrepancy between the number of voters and the number of ballots at some locations. Now, Elections Administrator Toni Pippins-Poole is asking for a recount of backup paper ballots.
"They found that there were 44 flash drives that had not been turned in by the time that the voting had been terminated at the end of the election day,'' said Carol Donovan, Chair of the Dallas County Democratic Party.
Each of those flash drives came from a voting machine. In a statement, Pippins-Poole said 16 were not received in a timely manner, and 28 were from voting machines that weren't scheduled to be used. Donovan stressed that the issue was not equipment error.
"This was a human error. It was based on people not getting their flash drives in on time," she said.
Dallas County Republican Party chair Rodney Anderson said his focus is on the process.
"How did this happen, where did it happen, how is it possible that almost a week after the election that there are now ballots have been found?," he asked.
While Donovan estimates around 7,000 votes were affected, Anderson said his camp has received no information from the Elections Department.
"They obviously have either more information or are digging into numbers more than what we've been able to get from the Elections Department," he said.
Both parties said they don't believe a recount would change the outcome of any races. But they're both awaiting the hearing to learn which polling sites were involved.
That hearing will be Tuesday at 10 a.m.
