Ballot instructions corrected for Republicans delegates; 73 voters notified

CONNERSVILLE — A technical error on the Republican primary ballot led the Fayette County Election Board to take corrective action this past week, though Clerk Dawn Hughes says the issue was resolved quickly and with minimal cost to taxpayers.
The problem was flagged on Thursday, April 9, around 1:30 p.m. While all candidates were listed correctly on the machines, the instructions for the Republican state convention delegates were incorrect. The machines told voters to select four candidates, when the actual number was supposed to be eight.
After a three-way call between the Election Board and representatives from MicroVote, the county’s equipment provider, the board made the bipartisan decision to close polling locations an hour early on Thursday to prevent any further confusion.
Hughes contacted the Indiana Election Division and spoke with Valerie Warycha, who confirmed the situation is covered by the state’s election handbook and Indiana Code.
“She told me it’s super common and that we had plenty of runway to get this fixed,” Hughes said.
Technicians from MicroVote arrived Friday morning to reprogram the machines, allowing polls to open on schedule at 8:30 a.m.
The service call and new ballot printing totaled $1,070, an expense Hughes said was already part of the office budget. However, the county caught a break on the final bill. A MicroVote facility in Tennessee recently lost equipment in a fire and needed “talk back” which are headphones that help voters with certain disabilities, the units are from older machines. Hughes had 19 of those units in storage.
MicroVote credited the county $50 per unit, a $950 total that brought the final bill down to approximately $120.
The Clerk’s office immediately reached out to the 73 Republican voters who walked in and voted before the machines were fixed. Those voters have the option to return and revote their entire ballot.
“It’s no different than if someone had passed away during early voting,” Hughes explained. “You’re going to revote the whole ballot because we can’t just do a portion of it.”
If a voter chooses to revote, the original ballot will be retracted and redacted on election night to ensure only the new vote is counted. Voters who do not wish to return do not have to; their original votes will still be tallied as cast.
Hughes noted that the decision to close early on Thursday was made by the bipartisan Election Board and that the error was strictly limited to the number of Republican delegates for convention.

For more information, the Fayette County Clerk’s office can be reached at 765-825-1813