MICHIGAN BLAMES A CLERK FOR THE GLITCH nothing to see here

State election agency says failure to update software caused Antrim County election glitch

LANSING A failure to update software was the reason for a computer glitch that caused massive errors in unofficial election results reported from Antrim county, the Michigan Department of State said late Friday.

"The erroneous reporting of unofficial results from Antrim county was a result of accidental error on the part of the Antrim County clerk," the state agency that oversees elections said in a news release.

There was no problem with the voting machines or vote totals, which were preserved on tapes printed from the tabulators, the state said. The problem occurred when the totals by precinct were combined into candidate county-wide totals for transfer to the state, using election management system software, the state agency said in a news release.

"All ballots were properly tabulated. However, the clerk accidentally did not update the software used to collect voting machine data and report unofficial results."

State officials did not immediately respond to questions about whether they track when and how local officials update their election-related software or whether local officials are required to report needed updates to the state, once they are completed.

But they said any such errors in any county would be caught during the canvassing process, before results are declared official, when boards composed of two Democrats and two Republicans compare the numbers on the tapes printed from the tabulators to the unofficial results that were reported to the state.

https://www.freep.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/11/06/antrim-county-vote-glitch-software-update/6194745002/