Election Officials Will Need Days To Finish Counting Votes
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Regardless of whether Gov. Pat Quinn concedes the race to Bruce Rauner anytime soon, it will be days before an official count confirms who won the race for Illinois governor.
Rauner declared victory Tuesday night, but Quinn has said he wants all the votes counted, even though he is behind by more than 175,000 votes, with 99 percent of the vote counted.
WBBM Newsradio Political Editor Craig Dellimore reports those who took part in the pilot same-day registration and voting process on Tuesday cast ballots considered to be provisional, pending verification of the voter's status, so they haven't been counted yet.
Cook County Clerk's Office spokeswoman Courtney Greve said there are approximately 9,000 provisional ballots from suburban Cook, along with 30,000 to 40,000 uncounted mail-in ballots.
Chicago Board of Election Commissioners spokesman Jim Allen said there are about 9,900 uncounted absentee ballots from Chicago, and he can't say how many provisional ballots have been cast in the city's 2,069 precincts.
"Any voters who cast a provisional ballot, whether it was in their precinct, or at one of the same-day registration sites, they have seven days to provide the election authority with evidence to support their claim to be a legitimate registered voter," he said.
Most provisional voters who provided two pieces of identification when they registered, but election officials said they can't tell if there are enough uncounted votes to change any election results – whether in the governor's race, or otherwise.