By Nathan Ham
Four precincts in North Carolina have had their voting hours extended due to computer and printer errors that occurred this morning. Those precincts involved were Bluford Elementary School in Greensboro, First Missionary Baptist Church in Concord, Plainview Fire Station in Dunn, and Sampson County Adult Daycare in Clinton. North Carolina law requires all precincts to be closed before any county can release voting data.
This morning, Watauga County Board of Elections Director Matt Snyder highlighted what would take place should an event such as this happen.
All North Carolina ballots were expected to be available for release starting at 7:30 p.m. “unless there is a precinct in the state that is kept open then we can’t release the numbers until the last precinct in the state is closed. So, if they had a power outage or were down for a few hours and stayed open,” Snyder said.
In a follow-up phone call this evening, Snyder indicated that as long as nothing else goes wrong at any of the other precincts in the state before 7:30 p.m., then the release of absentee and early-voting ballots will happen at 8:15 p.m. and then ballots from precincts will be released as soon as they make their way back to the board of elections office.