Sherburne County planning to recount votes after election night ballot issue
Sherburne County officials plan to recount votes in certain races after some mail-in ballots weren’t included in election night totals.
As previously reported, the District 14B race between Democrat Dan Wolgamott and Republican Sue Ek in St. Cloud had Wolgamott winning by 28 votes after it had been previously reported that Ek won by four votes.
Sherburne County election staff then discovered some absentee ballots received through the mail were not included in unofficial totals uploaded to the Minnesota Secretary of State’s Office on election night.
After the addition of the absentee ballots, Wolgamott increased his lead by 191 votes, which caused Minnesota Republican Party Chair David Hann to demand that Secretary of State Steve Simon investigate.
Sherburne County officials clarified that no votes were lost or found and that all ballots cast in the election were properly received, documented and counted; however, some ballot totals were not uploaded to the Secretary of State’s website on election night.
The ballots that didn’t upload were mail-in ballots that were “accepted by a bipartisan ballot board, properly processed, counted, and included in the printed and electronic tabulations generated at Sherburne County on election night (known as summary statements or ‘tapes’).”
Sherburne County officials say the totals on the local summary statements have not changed from election night.
The upload failure from the county to the Secretary of State’s Election Reporting System (ERS) was caused by an improperly cleared or partially damaged memory card that didn’t fully collect and transmit results from some of the mail-in ballots.
The memory card also transmitted to the ERS generic “test” data made for testing the reporting system before the election.
County officials say that attempts to correct the upload error on election night failed, and partially missing mail-in ballot totals and test data were displayed in online results.
After discovering the issue, Sherburne County contacted the Secretary of State’s Office and uploaded a verified set of unofficial election results. County staff also contacted the candidates affected to let them know about the issues.
Sherburne County has asked the Secretary of State’s Office for permission to hold public recounts for the close races most impacted by the delayed reporting if it is requested by a candidate. The county says they have received preliminary approval to recount certain races, if requested by a candidate, that don’t fall within the threshold for a mandatory publicly funded recount.
In Scott County, election officials rescanned ballots on Friday night after what they describe as a distribution error and scanning machine malfunction at a county facility.
This issue affected a portion of ballots in Shakopee, where there’s another tight House race between DFL incumbent Brad Tabke and Republican Aaron Paul. As of Saturday evening, unofficial election results have Tabke winning the district by 13 votes.
Minnesota House Speaker-designate Lisa Demuth (R-Cold Spring) released the following statement about the malfunctions in both Sherburne and Scott counties:
“The errors and discrepancies we’ve seen this cycle are intolerable and unacceptable. A free and fair election demands sunlight on the process. These incidents fuel distrust and raise questions about the integrity and accuracy of election results.
Without an opportunity to observe or respond Sherburne County added newly-found votes to the total. Just a day later, Scott County announced an unspecified “ballot distribution error” and “ballot scanning malfunction” that triggered an abrupt re-scan of more than 20,000 ballots. There was less than two hours notice between the public announcement and the beginning of the re-scan process.
Actions by county officials to prevent campaign staff and the public from recording or broadcasting a public re-scan taking place in a government building raises additional concerns. The incidents on election night and in St. Cloud and Shakopee demand a response and accountability from the Secretary of State, and the legislature must explore election reforms to ensure these problems do not occur in the future.”
The races carry high significance as they could determine who controls the Minnesota House of Representatives, which is currently deadlocked at 67-67.