Uncounted ballots found after election
Nearly 200 boxes of uncounted votes have surfaced in Puerto Rico, a full week after voters went to the polls to choose their governor, legislators and mayors across the island, dealing another black eye to the mistrusted government.
The discovery of uncounted ballots could have sweeping effects in close races around the island, in particular the tight contest for mayor of San Juan, where the sudden influx of new votes could force a recount. Officials acknowledged that the votes could change the results of particularly narrow races, which had already been preliminarily certified. In the city of Culebra, the mayor’s race currently has a margin of just two votes; in Guánica, nine.
The electoral muddle — coming three months after a disastrous primary in which people waited hours in sweltering heat for ballots that never arrived — further undermined confidence in the electoral process and underscored the deep distrust that many residents have long had for the government.
The electoral results last week in Puerto Rico were already making history. For the first time, Puerto Rico’s legislature will be made up of a solid mix of politicians from different parties.
The president of Puerto Rico’s State Electoral Council, Francisco Rosado Colomer, acknowledged that the elections were disorganized, which he said was a result of the coronavirus pandemic. The unusual avalanche of mail-in votes made it hard to keep up, he said.
In the newly discovered boxes, many uncounted ballots from different precincts were found mixed together “in the wrong place, badly organized,” Rosado said. But he stressed that none of them had left the elections vault, and their discovery underscored the transparency of the process.