State elections officials: 40 percent of voters had cast ballots by 10 a.m.

Media General News Service

Published: November 4, 2008

By 10 a.m. today, about 40 percent of Virginia’s registered voters had cast their ballots, according to state elections officials.

That figure does not include more than a half-million absentee ballots that the state had already received.

Nancy Rodrigues, secretary of the board of elections, this afternoon called the turnout “phenomenal” and noted that some polls opened with 500 people in line.

She said registrars are urging people to vote before 4 p.m. if possible to reduce the strain on the polls tonight. The polls close at 7 p.m., but if you are in line at 7, you will be allowed to vote.

She said officials have received many reports of issues at the polls, but “the reality is we have not seen a pattern of widespread problems.“

There have been some allegations of voter suppression in Richmond, Virginia Beach and Chesapeake—that people outside the polls are “pouncing” on voters headed inside to ask about how they’re voting.

Rodrigues said 25 percent of the polling places in Virginia use optical scanning machines, which have run into problems in today’s wet weather. Voters hands get wet, they handle the ballots and that causes problems in the machines, she said. Voting officials whose precincts have these machines are putting paper ballots in locked box until they dry, and later tonight they will run them through the machines.