After the polls close on election day the Washington County Auditor’s office releases unofficial election results to the public before they are canvassed by the Washington County Board of Supervisors and made official. Washington County Auditor Dan Widmer released an announcement about an error that was made in the initial count of the ballots for the Primary Elections last Tuesday.

“While all absentee ballots were counted and tabulated by the Absentee Board on Election Day, information from the flash drive used to count the absentee ballots was not included in the results that were downloaded and forwarded to the Office of the Iowa Secretary of State. This resulted in the absentee ballot results not being included in the unofficial Election Summary Results provided to the public. Upon learning of the issue and concurring with staff at the Iowa Secretary of State’s office, my staff took immediate steps to properly correct the error and to communicate to key individuals what had occurred.” 

None of the results from last Tuesday’s elections were changed when the absentee votes were counted. The main election in question due to the missed absentee ballots was the Board of Supervisors District 3 in which Marcus Fedler had initially won by only five votes over Bill Poch, but now the margin of victory for Fedler has increased.