WFHB Bloomington Community Radio
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Two days after the midterm election, and no votes have officially been counted in northwestern Indiana’s Porter County.
Commissioners in Porter County asked the FBI on Wednesday to investigate, “scores of alleged violations of Indiana Election Law,” following Tuesday’s midterm election.
The county, which has 132 precincts in a predominantly Democratic area of of the state has yet to release election results. Porter County officials didn’t begin counting votes until 15 hours after polling places closed, on Wednesday morning. The delay is holding up final results of three state legislative races, two for the state House of representatives and one for the state Senate.
A statement from the Porter County commissioners claims poll workers, voters and other members of the public reported violations of Indiana Election Law, but did not offer information as to what those violations were.
The call for an FBI investigation comes after many reported problems in Porter County on election day.
Some polling places in the county opened over two hours late, prompting a judge to order 12 polls to remain open past their scheduled closing time.
In Porter County, local Republicans and Democrats spent Tuesday fighting over whether or not polls should stay open late. A judge’s order was opposed by the Indiana Republican Party Central Committee, arguing that voters had plenty of time to cast ballots through early voting. The argument didn’t convince the judge, who ordered polling places to stay open late.
This is the first year local elections were run by the Porter county clerk, Karen Martin. Until this year, elections in the county were run by the Porter County Voter Registration Office.
Martin also appeared on this year’s ballot in Porter County, running for auditor. On Tuesday, she blamed election troubles on poll workers quitting at the last minute. IndyStar reports some poll workers walked off the job on election day.
In the 2014 midterm elections, 35 percent of the county’s almost 120,000 registered voters cast ballots. In adjacent Lake County, which includes the city of Gary, 27% of the county’s over 350,000 registered voters cast ballots.
But in this year’s election, Lake County’s voter turnout jumped from 27% to 47%, with over 70 thousand more voters casting ballots in this year’s midterms.
Porter County Commissioners said earlier this week that all votes cast between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. Tuesday as well as absentee ballots and early votes would be counted yesterday. Provisional ballots and those cast after 6 p.m. on Tuesday will be counted by November 16, next Friday.
Commissioners are meeting with the FBI today.
