Nearly a quarter of Illinois counties are finding an unexpected problem at their polling places today: some primary ballots are too big and don’t fit into the scanning machines.
An error by two vendors means a long night of tabulating could get even longer. Some of the ballots are cut slightly too wide (a sixteenth of an inch, reportedly) and don’t fit into the machines that automatically read and tabulate the ballots in polling places. Winnebago County Clerk Margie Mullins says the votes WILL count: there’s no need to re-vote, and every vote WILL be properly counted. It’s going to take longer because they have to be counted by hand.
Not every ballot is affected, even within the same precincts. At least 24 counties and the city of Aurora are affected. Winnebago, Boone, Lee, Bureau, and DuPage are among those reporting the oversized paper ballots.