Pennsylvania Voters Request Numerous Precinct Election Recounts

Democratic Party materials encouraging people to vote in the midterm general election are seen in Philadelphia on Nov, 7, 2022. Mark Makela/Getty Images

Voters in some Pennsylvania counties are asking for recounts of the results of the Nov. 8 elections.

Some want an explanation for why the Department of State’s website reported shortly after polls closed on election night that 4.2 million more mail-in ballots had been cast in the governor’s race than the number of registered voters in Pennsylvania, while others cited problems they experienced at polling sites and want confirmation that their vote was counted.

Recount requests are expected this week in precincts in Northumberland, Westmoreland, Allegheny, McKean, Beaver, Delaware, Washington, Chester, Cumberland, Butler, Montgomery, Clarion, Bucks, Monroe, Dauphin, Columbia, Warren, Blair, Lebanon, and Berks counties, according to statewide political operatives.

Recount requests must be made now, because there’s only a five-day window for citizens to petition for a recount once a county’s Board of Elections finishes its computational canvassing, which is required before election certification.

While voters pay for the recount, if substantial error or fraud is revealed, the requesting voters will be reimbursed, according to state law. Voters can request a recount in their precinct through the county’s Court of Common Pleas for a $50 fee.

Voters Want Answers

In past years, election results posted on the Department of State website started rolling into the site an hour or more after the polls closed. It takes time for county precincts to get their results to the main county election center and forward the numbers to the state for the website.

This year, with mail-in voting starting before Election Day, counties were allowed to start counting mail-in ballots on Election Day as soon as polls opened at 7 a.m. Once polls closed at 8 p.m., the results could be made public.

About a half-hour after the polls closed, the mail-in ballot tally in the governor’s race was 10.7 million for Democrat Josh Shapiro and 2.5 million for Republican Doug Mastriano on the Department of State website. Together, that’s 13.1 million mail-in ballots for that race.

The Pennsylvania Department of State website on Nov. 8, 2022, 37 minutes after polls closed. Screenshot Courtesy of Audit the Vote PA

However, Pennsylvania has only 8.9 million registered voters, according to Department of State data; of those, 1.4 million were approved to receive mail-in ballots for the Nov. 8 election. That means the Department of State’s original numbers showed 4.2 million more mail-in votes than the total of registered voters.

The numbers didn’t stay that way. Today, the state’s website shows just over 1 million mail-in votes for Shapiro and 186,000 for Mastriano. Voters want to know what caused the earlier numbers to be posted on the results page.

The Department of State didn’t respond by press time to a request by The Epoch Times for comment.