Pennsylvania county promises accurate tally after clerical error appears to flip votes for judges

By MICHAEL RUBINKAM
Associated Press

A clerical error in an eastern Pennsylvania county caused votes to appear to be flipped on a ballot question that asked whether a pair of incumbent state appeals judges should be retained. The issue affected all of the county’s voting machines in use Tuesday, but county officials say only affected how the votes appeared on a paper summary shown to voters. They said the voters’ choices were properly recorded by the machines’ back end system. The Pennsylvania Department of State said the problem was isolated to the two judicial retention votes in Northampton County and that no other races statewide were affected. The voting machine company is Electronic Systems & Software. It acknowledged the problem and said it was a result of human error.