Outstanding votes in Allegheny County could sway races, but will take time to count

Allegheny County elections officials have tallied the vast majority of votes cast in Tuesday’s primary, but some races remain too close to call and could be decided by remaining votes that need to be tabulated.

Officials said some of the outstanding votes will be counted on Friday, but it’s unlikely all of the remaining ballots will be counted by then.

The county said votes cast in person in 31 precincts still need to be counted. Most of those votes weren’t counted because some poll workers forgot to turn in memory sticks that attach to poll machines. Of the 31 precincts, 30 had unreturned memory sticks. That’s out of 1,323 total precincts in the county.

Allegheny County spokeswoman Amie Downs said the problem happens on a small scale every election. She noted that the county relies on more than 600 residents to work the polls, and even though they are trained, sometimes poll workers can become flustered during long shifts and make minor mistakes.

“Human error happens. This happens every election,” Downs said.

Tuesday’s turnout of 36.4% also made polling places busier than anticipated. Before Tuesday, Allegheny County spokeswoman Amie Downs said about 35% of Republicans were expected to cast ballots in the primary as were about 30% of registered Democrats.

Allegheny County Democratic Chair Eileen Kelly said the overall turnout was about 10% higher than usual for a midterm primary. She attributed that to competitive races, pointing to high-profile races for U.S. Senate and U.S. House. She thinks the increased use of mail-in ballots has also increased turnout.

“I think (the higher turnout) is going to stay this high” in future elections, Kelly said. “I think people are going to get back into voting (because) they realize nowadays that they need to express their voice.”

Allegheny County Republican Chair Sam DeMarco attributed the higher-than-average turnout to competitive primaries and general dissatisfaction among voters.

“There are a lot of people that are unhappy. You can be on the left, and you can’t sit there and tell me things are going well, with high gas prices and inflation,” DeMarco said. “On our side, the Republican side, people are angry. There are people that have not gotten over the 2020 election. They are determined to have their say.”

Several races across the state remain too close to call and could hinge on the outstanding votes. They include the Democratic race in Pennsylvania’s 12th Congressional District and the Republican U.S. Senate race.

The top two candidates in the Democratic primary in the 12th District are separated by less than half a percentage point. State Rep. Summer Lee, D-Swissvale, led Pittsburgh attorney Steve Irwin by 446 votes as of Wednesday afternoon, according to unofficial tallies. In-person votes still need to be counted in 26 precincts in the 12th District, which includes Pittsburgh, Allegheny County suburbs and western communities in Westmoreland County.

Lee’s campaign declared victory in the race, noting that many of the outstanding precincts are in areas where Lee performed well. Lee’s campaign also noted that she won reported in-person votes in Allegheny County by a 3-2 margin over Irwin, and in-person voting receipts from 13 of the 26 outstanding precincts netted her an additional 71 votes.

“We built a movement in Western Pennsylvania that took on corporate power, stood up for working families and beat back a multimillion-dollar smear campaign,” Lee said of the rugged campaign.

Irwin’s campaign has not conceded and said Tuesday that it was waiting for all of the votes to be counted.

“We are moving forward with full confidence,” Irwin’s campaign said.

In the Republican Senate race, television personality Mehmet Oz and former hedge fund CEO David McCormick were separated by 1,879 votes on Wednesday afternoon, with Oz leading by 0.15 percentage points, unofficial tallies showed. Some mail-in votes still need to be counted across Pennsylvania, and Allegheny County’s outstanding in-person votes also could be a factor.

Allegheny County is McCormick’s home county, and he’s had a 39%-to-33% edge over Oz in in-person votes counted so far. NBC News political correspondent Steve Kornacki reported that there remain 6,000 to 7,000 in-person votes to be counted in Allegheny County.

Downs said there also are provisional and military ballots to be counted. Those votes, along with some of the remaining in-person votes, will be added to the total on Friday when the county election return board meets, Downs said.

“We expect some results to change on Friday,” she said.

She said it’s unlikely that all of the in-person votes will be counted on Friday, as it usually takes about six days for all of the voting machine scanners to be returned to the county. As the scanners are returned, county election officials can retrieve all of the memory sticks that weren’t turned in on Tuesday night.

Downs said security protocols are in place prohibiting officials from retrieving memory sticks from polling locations.

“The whole return board process is open to the candidates and the public,” said Downs. “And we won’t do anything outside of that.”

The election return board will be sworn in at 9 a.m. Friday at the Elections Division in the County Office Building in Downtown Pittsburgh. The county said the bulk of the board’s work will be done at the Elections Warehouse in the North Side. Members of the press, public, political parties and candidates will be allowed to view the meetings and work being done at the warehouse.