What happens if a ballot in Pennsylvania is damaged?

HARRISBURG, Pa. - Local election officials in Pennsylvania say ballots don't always arrive in the best condition. They may be ripped, stained by coffee or food, or even been burned on the edges. In these situations, officials can reconstruct the ballot in a duplicate to ensure that they are properly counted by election equipment.

The process, commonly referred to as "ballot duplication," involves taking a damaged ballot that can't be scanned by election machines and transcribing the votes onto a new, clean ballot that can be counted. The original ballot is preserved in this process. Ballot duplication can also be used if voters improperly marked their ballot, such as using the wrong type of writing tool.

"There’s always in every election some ballots that are damaged or unscannable, whether it was ripped or coffee spilled on the ballot, which made the scanner not be able to read it. There’s plenty of reasons why a ballot might need to be duplicated," said Philadelphia City Commissioner Seth Bluestein, who serves on the board that oversees elections in the city. "Any ballot that is unscannable by the tabulation equipment would need to go through this process."

Ballot duplication is used in 42 states, including Pennsylvania, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. All of these states use duplication for damaged ballots, and 31 states duplicate both damaged and defective ballots, such as ballots with stray marks.

Tammy Patrick, chief program officer at the National Association of Election Officials and a former elections official for Arizona's Maricopa County, said she’s encountered all kinds of damaged and improperly marked ballots.

"Literally, the dog ate my ballot. I’ve seen that," Patrick said. "You have individuals that use a marking device that is non-standard. So, literally, a crayon. I’ve seen lipstick. I’ve seen eyebrow pencil. I’ve seen all sorts of things on ballots. So those types of markings are not the sort of thing that normally a voting system would be able to read."

In Berks County, ballot duplication is typically only used for mail and absentee ballots because the county uses ballot marking devices for in-person Election Day voting, according to Stephanie Nojiri, assistant director of elections for the county. It’s rare in Berks County for mail or absentee ballots to be returned mangled, but it does happen. Sometimes ripped ballots can be patched together with tape and successfully scanned, but otherwise officials will have to recreate the ballot, Nojiri added.

The exact procedures that Pennsylvania counties use in this process vary. Berks County, for instance, uses a ballot marking device to recreate damaged ballots, while Philadelphia election officials recreate such ballots manually.

Philadelphia election workers conduct ballot duplication and observers representing political parties or candidates can watch the process, said Commissioner Bluestein.

Pennsylvania state law prohibits election officials from opening mail or absentee ballots before 7:00 a.m. on Election Day. So Philadelphia election officials have to wait to process mail ballots that show obvious signs of damage, Bluestein added.

"There’s nothing we can do about those until after the polls open on Election Day," he said.

Patrick said that ballot duplication processes are verifiable and reliable.

"Everything is recorded and documented and auditable and reviewable. So it’s not that they’re just taking random ballots, marking them and sending them through. They have to be tied specifically to the original ballot," she said "You can always go back and pull up that original ballot and compare it to make sure that the team did, in fact, mark them appropriately."