Deputy Clerk of the City of Madison, Jim Verbick, has confirmed that 2,215 duplicate absentee ballots are being sent out across ten wards, just weeks ahead of the critical presidential election.
Verbick claims that the ballots were sent due to a data processing error, which was allegedly caused by a mistake when attempting to merge files containing absentee ballots for voters with identical ballot styles, WKOW reported.
“There was a human error that occurred. Despite duplicate ballots being sent out, we will only accept one ballot from every voter, and when we get them back we will make sure that we only have one ballot.”
According to the Madison Clerk’s Office:
The Madison Clerk’s Office is rectifying a data processing error that caused duplicate absentee ballots to be sent to around 2,000 voters. The error affected only an isolated number of voters and was quickly caught and corrected so that it will not affect any other ballots going forward.
The Clerk’s office has been contacting voters individually to inform them of the error, caution them to submit only one ballot, and to destroy the second one to avoid any confusion.
Because the duplicate ballot envelopes have identical barcodes, in the unlikely event that a voter submits two absentee ballots, only one can be counted.
Once that envelope barcode is scanned, the voting system does not allow a ballot with the same barcode to be submitted. The voter is also marked in the poll book as having submitted their absentee ballot as another safeguard against the voter submitting a second ballot.
The clerk’s office insists that the problem is being addressed, but with confidence in election processes already fragile, many are questioning if this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Hellbound and Down 