Primary looming, Washington tests ballot counting system

VANCOUVER, Wash. (KOIN) — In 2016, Washington’s GOP primary was practically meaningless since Donald Trump already secured the nomination by the time it was held. And Democrats held caucuses two months earlier.

That’s why a year ago the Washington legislature moved their presidential primary to March 10 — just one week after Super Tuesday — in an effort to give state voters more say in the parties’ nominees.

With the Iowa caucus vote-counting debacle still fresh in the minds of political observers, Nevada officials faced scrutiny of their vote-tabulating process. It went smoothly and gave a big boost to Bernie Sanders.

Tuesday afternoon, Clark County Elections officials will test the “logic and accuracy” of the programming they’ll use to tabulate the ballots and report the results for the primary in 2 weeks.

Clark County (Washington) Elections
Washington state 2020 Presidential Primary

All registered voters in Clark County were mailed ballots last Friday. In Washington, each major political party requires voters to choose a party in order to vote in the primary. That is, a voter who identifies as Democrat can not vote for the Republican and vice versa. Anyone who tries to change their primary party declaration might not have their vote counted.

A voter can vote for whomever they choose in the November general election.

The returned ballots will be scanned for tabulation beginning at 7 p.m. on March 10. Officials said results should be available online around 8:30 p.m. that night.

But Washington voters will see 13 names on the Democratic side of the ballot, including
Andrew Yang, Cory Booker, Michael Bennett, Deval Patrick and John Delaney. They all recently dropped out, long after the deadline for appearing on the ballot passed.

And it’s possible, given the math and money equations candidates will face after the results of Super Tuesday on March 3, that even more candidates could drop out.

The Oregon presidential primary is set for May 19, 2020.