Allegheny County Election Board calculates votes from 10 machines, reviews mail-in and provisional ballots
PITTSBURGH (KDKA/AP) -- The Allegheny County Election Board was sworn in Friday and is working to sort out the remaining issues following Tuesday's primary election.
Inside the county's election warehouse, they were looking at getting votes from 10 voting machines that had not yet been counted.
Two of the machines had memory sticks with errors because they were not shut down properly, officials said. That was addressed and the more than 400 votes in them now have been calculated.
Of the other eight machines, four were missing the memory sticks, so the paper ballots are being used to calculate those votes.
So two machines has errors because they were not shut down properly. The other 8 were believed to have the memory stick locked in the machine. In four of the machines that was the case. For the other four, the paper ballots will now count the vote for that precinct. @KDKA
— Chris Hoffman (@NewsmanChris) May 20, 2022
Thirty-five absentee ballots still need to be counted, as they were not calculated on election night.
The board is also looking at 281 mail-in ballots that were either missing a signature, date or both. Lawyers from campaigns are in the warehouse to discuss with the board if the ballots should be counted or not.
There are also at least 1,900 provisional ballots from Allegheny County that still need to be counted. The return board is currently reviewing them too.
Keep checking our elections results page here as the remaining votes are counted.
University of Pittsburgh political science professor Chris Bonneau said the process is operating as it's supposed to.
"Just because votes are being counted doesn't mean they are found votes or new votes; these are votes that were legally cast by fellow citizens," Bonneau said.
Of the process, Bonneau said systems are more transparent now than they were even just 10 years ago.
"I don't see any reason that people should dispute the fact that their votes count," Bonneau said over Zoom.
The Democratic race for the 12th Congressional District had a razor-thin margin, but the AP declared Summer Lee the victor over Steve Irwin Friday evening.
On Twitter, Lee celebrated her victory while Irwin conceded.
I am so grateful for every single person who helped this campaign deliver a victory for our movement in #PA12.
— Summer Lee (@SummerForPA) May 21, 2022
They told us we couldn't take on corporate power and win. That it wasn't our turn yet. That we couldn't change the way we build power.
But we proved them wrong.
Thank you, #PA12. pic.twitter.com/jW6nbsvchM
— Steve Irwin (@SteveIrwinPA) May 21, 2022
In the Republican race for U.S. Senate, Dr. Mehmet Oz and Dave McCormick are facing off for the nomination.
Oz, who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump, led McCormick by 1,079 votes, or 0.08 percentage points, out of 1,340,248 ballots counted as of 5 p.m. Friday. The race is close enough to trigger Pennsylvania's automatic recount law, with the separation between the candidates inside the law's 0.5% margin.