Potentially thousands of mail ballots requested by Butler County voters appear to be lost, a county official said Wednesday, and the U.S. Postal Service has been asked to immediately investigate what happened to them.
A USPS spokesperson, meanwhile, said the agency is “unaware of any significant delays or issues and is in regular contact with the Board of Election as we work to locate and deliver ballots as they are presented to us.”
As of Tuesday, Pennsylvania voters are no longer able to apply for an absentee or mail-in ballot.
Nearly 40,000 registered voters in the county requested mail ballots. So far, only 24% of them have been returned to the county, by far the lowest rate among the state’s 67 counties. The county with the next-lowest return rate, Fayette, has received 50% of requested ballots.
“At first we thought that maybe it just was a delay in the postal system” due to high volume, Leslie Osche, chair of the Butler County commissioners, told Post-Gazette news partner KDKA-TV. “And that could still be the case. But nonetheless, when we realized that, we changed our strategy and now have begun to tell folks that if they haven’t received a ballot, they still have multiple options.”
But this week, county call centers and email addresses set up to handle elections issues were flooded with messages. By Tuesday morning, officials abandoned any hope that the ballots would arrive and launched plans to get new ballots out to voters, Osche said.