Election Day Live: Western Pa. voters head to the polls
The presidential candidates are done campaigning. Local candidates made their pitches. Now it’s the voters’ turn to speak.
Today is Election Day and TribLIVE reporters reported throughout the day from polling places around Western Pennsylvania, from Greensburg and Tarentum to Pittsburgh and the North Hills, and everywhere in between.
11:55 p.m. Poll workers still returning ballots hours after polls close
Returns from in-person voting at Westmoreland County’s 307 was slow going Tuesday.
At 11:30 p.m., the county had reported results from just 87 precincts, about 28% of the county. Those precincts represented, along with mail-in ballots reported, more than 114,000 ballots cast so far. There are 253,799 registered voters in the county.
Long lines of poll workers returning ballots from the precincts stretched around the park police desk near the front door of the courthouse as midnight approached, leaving elections officials scrambling to update results. In previous years, the county had reported results from most precincts by midnight.
Turnout could reach 80% this year, officials said.
10:30 p.m. 421 precincts reporting in Allegheny County
Allegheny County reported there have been more than 348,000 total mail-in and absentee ballots recorded as returned. Of those, more than 125,000 have been scanned.
Of the in-person voting, 421 of the county’s 1,323 precincts have been tallied, according to county spokeswoman Amie Downs.
~ Tom Davidson
9:40 p.m. Butler County reports machine issues
Butler County Commissioners Chairwoman Leslie Osche said ballot counting will continue until 11 p.m. this evening and will resume at 8:30 a.m. tomorrow morning.
The Butler County Board of Elections reported nearly 50% of the mail-in and absentee ballots returned have been counted, but due to mechanical issues with a ballot scanner, the process of counting votes is slower than anticipated. Osche said a technician was on site and a second scanner is expected to arrive in the morning.
Preliminary returns from today’s in-person voting will be posted on the county website as the precincts come in.
9 p.m. No major problems reporters at polls statewide
Gov. Tom Wolf and Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar said there were only isolated problems at the polls and no significant issues reported during Tuesday election.
They also reiterated people to be patient as the votes are tallied.
“I encourage all of us to take a deep breath and be patient,” Wolf said. “I’m urging Pennsylvanians to be calm, stay patient and remain calm in the days ahead.”
The state is ready to defend any judicial challenges brought to halt the process before it is finished, Wolf said.
“We’re going to stand up to anybody who wants to silence the Pennsylvanians who voted,” Wolf said. “Free and fair elections are a bedrock of our democracy. Today, the people of Pennsylvania have spoken, and the vote of every Pennsylvanian will be counted.”
The process went “remarkably smoothly” given in was the first presidential election where voters were allowed to request a mail-in ballot without having an excuse that kept them from going to the polls, Boockvar said.
The few reports of confusion at the polls were isolated and the result of election workers and voters adapting to new voting procedures, Boockvar said.
~ Tom Davidson
8:55 p.m. Long day ends for Hempfield poll workers
After a hectic morning, voting closed out quietly Tuesday at Hempfield’s Maplewood precinct, with a lone voter casting a ballot in the final half hour before polls closed at 8 p.m. at Maplewood United Presbyterian Church.
“I just procrastinated,” said Gregory Keller, 44, who recently moved to the South Greensburg area.
He said it was important for him to get his vote counted. “I’m not happy with the way things have been going,” he said. “I was happy with the way things were four years ago.”
He expressed hope that, in the years to come, “all this (pandemic) stuff will be gone and we’ll have a better economy with more jobs.”
Keller cast the 759th ballot among the roughly 1,400 voters registered in the precinct.
According to Susan Fischer, the judge of elections, that’s about double the number of ballots that were cast in the presidential election four years ago.
“By far, it’s the most that we’ve ever had,” Fischer said.
The six Maplewood poll workers were barely able to keep up with the rush of voters in the morning.
“I didn’t get to eat my breakfast until 1,” said veteran poll worker Josephine Delligatti, 92, of Hempfield.
During the day, a few confused voters had to be directed to the opposite end of the church social room, where voting was simultaneously taking place in Hempfield’s neighboring Eastview precinct.
Compared to a normal turnout of up to 40%, the Eastview poll workers saw 361 voters show up, out of 731 registered.
9 p.m. Judge resolves battle over voter ID
A Crafton poll worker was hauled into election court late Tuesday for allegations that she defied a court order by refusing to allow a 35-year-old new voter from casting his ballot.
However, Kimberly Mack, who has served as an elections worker for 10 years, said she didn’t defy any court order. Instead, she was following the oath she signed that requires poll workers to check the identification of all first-time voters.
The problem began about 6:30 p.m., Mack said, when a first-time voter arrived at St. Matthew’s Church Hall on East Steuben Street without any form of identification and an unsigned voter registration card.
Mack said she asked the voter for any kind of ID — a student ID, driver’s license, library card — anything proving who he was.
During a brief hearing before Common Pleas Judge Lawrence O’Toole, Mack said the man refused to provide anything. So she offered him a provisional ballot twice.
“He said, ‘provisional ballots are fake,’” she recounted.
Judge O’Toole issued an order requiring the poll workers at Crafton Ward 2, District 1, to allow a person to “vote upon presentation of a voter identification card.”
But Mack said she did not believe an unsigned card was acceptable. Sheriff’s deputies were ordered to pick Mack up at the polling place and take her to a hearing before the judge.
O’Toole repeatedly asked Mack why she ignored his order.
She said she did not. Instead, she wanted clarification that an unsigned card counted.
An hour later, she continued, the man returned with the card signed. Eventually, he was permitted to vote.
Assistant County Solicitor George Janocsko told O’Toole that since the vote was recorded, he saw no reason to hold Mack in contempt.
But he said ignoring the court order, and “instead relying on some oath that [she] took, “was appalling.”
Mack, who is Black, said she would never work the polls again.
After the hearing she said she believed that there were two sets of rules — one for Black people and one for white people.
Mack believes the man purposely withheld identification to cause trouble.
— Paula Reed Ward
8:25 p.m. Allegheny County nears 100,000 mail-in ballots counted
County worked have scanned 95,998 ballots, with the first set of 65,000 added to the Elections Results page.
As of 8 p.m., the county recorded as received 347,670 of the 413,716 applications for mail-in and absentee ballots approved. This includes the emergency ballots that were applied for over the past week.
The number of mail-in ballots received will continue to increase as those received Tuesday are added to the total.
8 p.m. 3 polls in Westmoreland County remain open
Polls across Pennsylvania were to close at 8 p.m., though Westmoreland County officials said lines remained at several precincts as polls.
Commissioner Doug Chew said voters were still waiting to cast ballots at the Rostraver Fellsburg polling location, Unity Dennison and at the Strawpump Volunteer Fire Department in North Huntingdon. Anyone in line at those precincts and others after the polls closed will still be able to vote, officials said.
Election officials closed the sole drop-off ballot box at the courthouse in Greensburg promptly at 8 p.m.
7:45 p.m. Pittsburgh poll worker, accused of photographing ballots, in trouble again
A poll worker who was removed from Ascension Church on Ellsworth Avenue for photographing ballots — but permitted to return after she promised a judge she’d stop it — is in trouble again.
Brittany Acosta was accused again Tuesday evening of photographing ballots just before 7 p.m. — just three hours after she assured Judge Jack McVay she would follow the rules he set for her.
Allegheny County sheriff’s deputies were on the way to remove her after additional complaints were made against her.
She was initially reported by fellow poll workers in the early afternoon, and sheriff’s deputies were dispatched to remove her at 1:30.
Acosta showed up at Election Court Downtown on her own, wearing a CNN Fake News mask, about an hour later to plead her case to be returned to her post.
McVay ordered her to follow all requirements of poll workers and forbade her from photographing any ballots or engaging in any disruptive behavior.
Included in his order, McVay told Acosta that if the elections judge requested her phone, she was required to relinquish it.
~ Paula Reed Ward
7 p.m. 20K ballots didn’t have bar codes in Allegheny County
About 20,000 mail-in ballots did not have bar codes and are being manually entered and checked in, Allegheny County spokeswoman Amie Downs said.
As of 6:40 p.m., the county had scanned 82,716 ballots. Within an hour or two, Downs said, most of the mail-in ballots will have been separated from the secrecy envelopes.
6:40 p.m. 2 women kicked out of North Huntingdon polling place, police report filed
Two women were asked to leave a North Huntingdon polling place Tuesday morning after they claimed to be poll workers and started looking through envelopes, officials said. According to Constable Jeff West, the women showed up at the Circleville Fire Hall identifying themselves as poll workers and saying they were there to help. The women left but returned around 10:30 a.m.
The women walked past the poll workers to a table with paperwork and started looking through it, said Vanda West, deputy constable. Jeff West said one woman pulled out a cellphone and was “I believe taking pictures.”
The judge of elections asked the women to provide paperwork identifying them as poll workers. The women, instead, provided a card that had a number for Election Protection, a national, nonpartisan group that works to ensure people have an equal opportunity to vote and that their vote counts.
Jeff West called the Westmoreland County Election Bureau, which reported the women were not verified poll workers. At that point, the judge of elections told them to leave.
After reporting to various polling places across the township, Jeff West said he learned the women went to the North Huntingdon Townhouse, where they told the judge of elections “how she needs to be doing her job.” Jeff West noted that he was not present for that incident.
Two different people sporting Election Protection shirts also showed up at the Penns Woods Civic Association but did not cause any issues, Vanda West said.
A report was filed by North Huntingdon police.
~ Megan Tomasic
6 p.m. Heavy turnout in Lower, Upper Burrell as voters cite concerns about casting ballots by mail
Voter turnout was heavy at the Church of God in Lower Burrell, where some people waited for 45 minutes early in the morning, and the Upper Burrell municipal building.
Turnout was estimated to be as high as 80% by one election official in Upper Burrell who declined to identify himself.
For voters who chose to vote in person, they said they were there to ensure their vote was counted.
“I don’t trust the mail-in voting,” said Nicole Lang, 37, of Upper Burrell, who wore a cloth Trump face mask to vote at the Upper Burrell municipal building.
Another Upper Burrell voter, Scott Brown, 47, who also voted for Trump, decided to vote in person because he said he wanted to be sure his vote would be counted.
“Here, only one person can touch the ballot,” Brown said. “With a mail-in ballot, 10 different people may touch it.”
In Lower Burrell, Nancy Romano, 71, visited the Church of God to cast her vote “mainly because of the uncertainty of mail-in ballots not being counted.”
Kimberly Baker, 43, visited her Lower Burrell polling place to make a statement about the importance, and safety, of voting.
“I’m here in person to show you don’t have to be scared to be out,” she said.
~ Mary Ann Thomas
6:05 p.m. In Bon Air, an empty building comes to life with voters
In Pittsburgh’s Bon Air neighborhood on the southern edge of the city, people vote in a building that once housed Bon Air Elementary School and later an early childhood center.
The building sits empty nearly every other day of the year, but this morning it was full of activity as a steady stream of people came in to vote. One of them was Tyler Droney, 32, of Bon Air, who said he always votes in person and has concerns about mail-in voting.
“I trust the system much more in person,” said Droney, a Donald Trump supporter. “I just like the physical presence.”
Droney said he feels Trump deserves another four years. “I hope to see him keep doing what he’s doing and keep to his policies,” said Droney.
Andrew Lucas, 23, and Molly McGill-Lucas, 23, of Bon Air, voted in person together.
“Part of it was just procrastination,” said Andrew Lucas. “We also want to make sure our votes get counted, and it’s nice to have that immediate feedback.”
Molly McGill-Lucas had a mail-in ballot, but brought to be voided by elections officials and then vote in person.
“Just making sure the vote was counted and not having to try and mail it today to get it where it needed to be by Friday, which is the deadline here in Pennsylvania,” said McGill-Lucas. Both she and her husband declined to say who they voted for. “So, it was really just making sure that instead of trying to rely on the mail, which I do for other things, that I was here in person to make sure the vote counts.”
By afternoon, voter traffic at the elementary school building had eased considerably.
Harold Marks, 72, of Bon Air, voted in person because he said he sent in for a ballot during the primary election and never received it. “I didn’t want to take a chance on not getting this one,” said Marks, who voted for Trump. “I’d like to see the economy return to what it was before the coronavirus showed up.”
Linda Sicker, 67, of Bon Air said, like Marks, she requested a mail-in ballot and never received it. She said she voted for Joe Biden.
“I’m tired of Donald Trump and the way he handled the virus, in particular, and I think we need somebody new,” Sicker said.
In Downtown Pittsburgh, there was a long line of voters doing their best to social distance while waiting to get into Trinity Episcopal Cathedral to cast their ballots. University of Pittsburgh student Sam Hanks, 19, a California native who lives Downtown, was voting in his first presidential election.
People doing their best to social distance while waiting in a long line to vote at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral Downtown. pic.twitter.com/3ekSCPxPW0
— Paul Guggenheimer (@PGuggenheimer) November 3, 2020
“I didn’t want to (mail) in a ballot. There was a certain kind of joy standing in front of a ballot and participating in a system that, at least in my opinion, is pretty cool,” said Hanks. “I took a real pride in it today.”
Hanks said he voted for Biden for many reasons. “Economic, social, political, but I don’t think I could boil it down to one thing.”
Ernest Hemingway, 53, of Downtown, said he didn’t mind waiting in a long line to vote.
“I feel it’s my civil duty to come down here and vote. I’d rather come in person to do it,” said Hemingway, who also voted for Biden. “The racial tension is terrible here, so I hope to see that change and changes with the police.”
~ Paul Guggenheimer
5:55 p.m. Poll worker accused of disruption allowed to return by Election Court judge
A poll worker at the Church of Ascension polling place on Ellsworth Avenue in Shadyside was allowed to return to her post after she was accused of photographing and video recording voters’ ballots
Brittany Acosta was reported by fellow poll workers, and sheriff’s deputies were dispatched to remove her at 1:30 p.m. Acosta showed up at Election Court Downtown on her own about an hour later to plead her case to be returned to her post.
She spoke — wearing a “CNN Fake News” mask — to Judge Jack McVay and was ultimately allowed to resume her status as a poll worker. McVay ordered her to follow all requirements of poll workers, underlining that she is not allowed to photograph any ballots or engage in any disruptive behavior.
McVay also told Acosta that if the elections judge requested her phone and its camera, she was required to relinquish it.
~ Paula Ward
5:50 p.m. Early technical issues cleared up in Unity
One of six voting machines in Unity’s Whitney precinct jammed Tuesday morning with the second ballot that was being processed. It took about 40 minutes for a technician to respond and clear the problem, according to Bill Walker, the judge of elections.
A morning wait of about 25 minutes for those seeking to cast their ballots was reduced to less than five minutes by mid-afternoon, he said.
Five poll workers were on hand Tuesday at the Whitney precinct, up from just two working the spring primary.
“I requested as many as they could give me, and they did,” Walker said.
By about 3:30 p.m., 692 of the precinct’s 1,614 registered voters had cast ballots. That was more than double the total turnout in the spring primary.
“This has been overwhelming,” Walker said of the voter response. “I’m happy to see it.”
~ Jeff Himler
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