VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — Every ballot that will be counted in this November election is now in the hands of election officials.
About 2,600 newly received absentee ballots in Virginia Beach will be added to election results soon.
Election officials received the last batch of absentee ballots on Friday. Some were eligible, and some were rejected because they were postmarked after Election Day.
More than 127,000 absentee and early votes have already been posted on the city's election results website.
“Thank God we started pre-processing back in the beginning of October, so if we hadn’t done that we’d still be working on getting those numbers," said Laura Kane, Virginia Beach absentee coordinator.
Now, election officials will review provisional ballots – about 2,000 of them in Virginia Beach – to verify if they will count.
“So anybody who may have tested our system in seeing if they could vote after they had already submitted an absentee ballot, they will see that they will get a rejection on that provisional ballot," Kane said.
Election officials will certify results on Tuesday. It’s been a grueling election season for workers, balancing new laws, the pandemic, and record voter turnout.
“The false information that was out there to scare maybe the voters has caused a lot of stress on the office, but just trying to work through all the misinformation," Kane said.
On Friday, Kane praised her staff, saying they have all worked about 80 hours a week for two months now, ensuring the integrity of this election.
“I have a lot of pride in my team and I’m very grateful," she said. "Everyone should know that all the hard work we put in is to make sure every vote is counted and to make sure nobody tried to commit any voter fraud."
Virginia Beach election officials contacted about 400 people who made mistakes on their ballots, allowing them to “cure” problems, like a signature issue, for example. About 100 people fixed their errors.