Boston officials say strong turnout contributed to ballot shortages at some polling places, with voters having to wait as new ballots were brought in.
The City of Boston has had to rush ballots to several polling places Tuesday amid "strong turnout," officials said.
Boston police were delivering extra ballots to two wards on Election Night after the precincts reported they were running low, according to the office of the Massachusetts secretary of state. They said Wards 18 and 20, in West Roxbury and Hyde Park, were in need of more ballots.
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The city later shared a statement noting the shortages — and police help replenishing the stocks — at several polling locations. Read their statement here:
With strong turnout across Boston this Election Day, several polling locations across the city have experienced ballot shortages during the evening voting rush. The Elections Department has been working urgently to remedy this through coordinating delivery of additional ballots to precincts with the help of Boston Police and contacting all polling locations to anticipate and prevent further ballot shortages. We apologize for any inconvenience or confusion, and are grateful for the diligent efforts of poll workers throughout the city to ensure that every voter can exercise their right to vote. Any voter in line by 8:00 p.m. at their polling location will be able to vote, and polling places will remain open to guarantee this access.
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Later, a spokeswoman for Massachusetts Secretary of State Bill Galvin shared more details on what took place, and said that anyone in line by 8 p.m. had a chance to vote, and that the city was instructed to have poll workers call any voter who chose not to wait for the ballots' delivery earlier.
Read her statement here:
Unfortunately, it appears that the Boston Elections Department chose not to send all ballots in their possession to polling places today. After receiving reports that certain precincts in the Hyde Park, Roslindale, and West Roxbury areas were running low on ballots or had run out of ballots, Secretary Galvin instructed the Boston Elections Department to send ballots to polling locations using police cars to deliver them as quickly as possible.
The city was also instructed to provide ballots to other locations, to ensure that they would not run out of ballots, and to instruct poll workers in affected precincts to get contact information for any voter who chose not to wait in line, so they could be contacted once ballots had arrived at their polling location.
Anyone who was in line at their polling place at 8 p.m. was able to vote, whether or not they were waiting for a delivery of ballots at that time.
While Kamala Harris was quickly projected to win Massachusetts' electoral votes over Donald Trump, the commonwealth has five ballot questions that were being closely contested.
