The most populous county in Arizona confirmed this week that it will likely take at least 11 to 13 days to count all of the ballot cast in next month’s presidential election.
According to county election officials, heavy turnout during this cycle put additional stress on the system, resulting in the likelihood for longer-than-usual tabulation delays.
As WPNX reported:
“We do expect that it will take between 10 and 13 days to complete tabulation of all of the ballots that come in, but we ask for the community’s patience,” Liewer said. “We want to make sure that this is a secure process, but we also want to make sure that it is an accurate process.”
The higher interest in the 2024 election and the fact that the ballot is two pages — an average of 79 contests per ballot — is exactly why officials are encouraging people to vote early, Maricopa County Supervisor Bill Gates said.
More than 2.1 million votes are expected this year and so far, 400,000 people have cast their ballots in Maricopa County.
“We are seeing a little bit of a lag of where we were in 2020 but the last few days we’ve actually seen an uptick in turnout,” Scott Jarrett, Maricopa County elections director, said. “So I am expecting that we will start approaching very close to those 2020 numbers.”
A number of voters eager to learn the results of the election as soon as possible expressed their frustration with the forecasted delay.
Here we go again…
🚨 Maricopa County, AZ Officials say it’s going to take TWO WEEKS after the Election to Tabulate the Votes 🤦🏻♂️
Want to know how ridiculous this is?
Florida counted nearly 11 million votes on Election Day, 2020.
Maricopa County, AZ, 400k people already… pic.twitter.com/gOCSwC0VL0
— MJTruthUltra (@MJTruthUltra) October 23, 2024
When you see "Maricopa County Election Delay" trending on Oct 23. pic.twitter.com/OcMRG3Sc3G
— Matthew H (@MattH_4America) October 23, 2024
Argentina counted 99.9% of the vote in 6 hours. Maricopa County needs 10 days.
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) October 23, 2024
It’s worth noting that Republicans appear to be exceeding expectations based on early voting totals in the county.
#GOP early voting continues to smash records in Maricopa County!!!
If this keeps pace for the next 16 days the swing races will be over before Nov 5th.
Text a friend, text your lazy brother, call your ex girlfriend, but get to the polls early or get those ballots mailed 😀 pic.twitter.com/9dl92OVx2z
— LegislativeDistrict13_AZGOP (@LD13_AZGOP) October 20, 2024
According to NewsNation, Arizona will likely be one of several states that prevent Americans from knowing the winner of the race on Election Night.
Arizona, where roughly 90% of ballots were mailed in during the 2020 election, historically takes longer to call due to the time it takes to determine which ballots can be counted based on the postmark.
Biden won Arizona by just 0.3% in 2020. Maricopa County, where much of the Phoenix metro area is located, is expected to garner the crux of the election attention four years after Biden won the county by 45,109 votes.
In 2020, after Trump claimed the election was stolen, Arizona Republicans commissioned a hand recount of Maricopa County’s 2.1 million ballots, which affirmed Biden had defeated Trump.
Election experts expect another close race in Arizona, keeping interest in the state high.
Delays could push the race into a critical position if the state is needed to secure victory for either candidate.
Here’s a closer look at those early numbers:
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