Judge orders PA elections board to extend hours as thousands of mail ballots go missing

A judge has ordered the Erie County Board of Elections to extend its operating hours and take other steps to ensure that thousands of voters who requested mail ballots but did not receive them can still get mail ballots and return them by the Election Day deadline. The lawsuit claimed that mail ballot return rates in Erie were below the statewide average, with only about 52% of voters who requested mail ballots receiving them by Oct. 28. In addition to the extended hours, the judge ordered the elections board to add another printer at its office, and allow voters who had applied for a mail ballot to cancel their request, be issued a new mail-in ballot immediately, and cast that mail-in ballot at one of two drop boxes at the Erie County Courthouse. The elections board has to ensure that enough ballots and provisional ballots are available at all Erie County polling locations, and must release the names and email addresses of the out-of-state voters still waiting on mail ballots to the parties, and, in some cases, use overnight delivery services to send replacement ballots to the out-of-state voters.