NORFOLK, Va. — With less than a week until Election Day, local election offices across the state are working hard to process thousands of backlogged voter registration applications that were delayed by a computer glitch.
Virginia Department of Elections officials said the applications of people who registered to vote at the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) between May and September never made it into the state system.
In a statement, a VDOE spokesperson state officials sent the records to local elections offices for processing.
“This has never been an issue in previous years where we had a backlog of applications that hadn’t been processed," Portsmouth General Registrar Alexandra Abell said. “We’re getting applications submitted in July, in August, in early September.”
A spokesperson for the state elections department blamed a “computing error” affecting 149,000 voter registration applications. State officials sent the additional records to Virginia’s 133 general registrars.
Suffolk General Registrar Burdette Lawrence confirmed her team is processing them “as quickly as possible.”
“Everyone receives information through the DMV portal so when that goes down or glitches, it goes down or glitches, it goes down and glitches for everyone," Lawrence said. “We started out with about 1,600... and we have processed down to about 400 left.”
Abell said her office has about 500 voter registration applications left to process.
Both Lawrence and Abell say they expect to process the backlog before Election Day and the people affected will be able to vote.
“Don’t panic, don’t be upset," Lawrence said. "We are processing, we have great direction from the Department of Elections, and we are speeding, we are getting them done as quickly as possible. As a matter of fact, we’re almost done.”
Abell said: “They will be processed but yes, it is an inconvenience more to the registrar’s offices throughout the Commonwealth, than the voters.”
Thanks to the new same-day voter registration law, you can still register to vote and vote at the same time, from now until Election Day. Your vote will be done by provision ballot. And yes, you can register and vote on Election Day.