Polling site at St. Sebastian’s school in Woodside Tuesday (Queens Post)
June 22, 2021 By Christina Santucci
Voters can expect to find out some initial vote tallies from today’s Primary Election following the close of the polls – but election officials estimate that the final results will not be certified until mid July.
The Board of Elections (BOE) plans to release preliminary, unofficial results of in-person Primary Day and Early Voting ballots after the polls close at 9 p.m., according to the city’s Campaign Finance Board.
More than 191,000 people – including 35,361 Queens residents – cast their ballots during the nine days of Early Voting, the BOE tweeted Sunday night.
The initial preliminary results will only include the tallies of the first-choice votes – and not which candidates scored second-, third-, fourth- and fifth-ranked spots on the ballots.
And tonight’s counts also won’t include affidavit and absentee ballots, which have to be postmarked by today and can arrive up through June 29 to be counted.
The BOE said that more than 90,000 absentee ballots – including more than 25,000 in Queens – had already been returned as of Monday evening. So far, 24,139 absentee ballots have been received from registered Democrats, 1,210 from Republicans and 12 from Conservatives in Queens, according to the BOE.
The BOE plans to release the preliminary, unofficial results of the ranked-choice voting tabulation for Primary Day and Early Voting ballots next week – on June 29. But these counts will not include absentee ballots.
Then, the results of the absentee ballots that have been tabulated up until that point will be announced the following week – July 6.
Election officials estimated that the final results from the Primary will be released and certified the week of July 12. These results will include any races that used the new ranked-choice voting system.
Under this setup, if a candidate receives more than 50 percent of the first-choice votes, then that candidate wins.
But if no candidate receives more than 50 percent of the first-choice votes initially, the candidate with the lowest number of votes is eliminated and their votes are redistributed to the candidates that voters ranked as their second choice.
This process continues in rounds until one candidate receives more than 50 percent of the votes.
Absentee Ballot totals (NY Board of Elections)
Featured Events
2 Comments
Announce the winner when all the votes have been counted–and not a day before.
It’s a terrible idea to release the 1st-choice results weeks before the final tally can change the winner. Some irresponsible early leaders may claim victory prematurely then rile up their fanbase when they later lose. It can cause distrust of the ranked-choice system and alienate voters. Does the B.O.E. want to sabotage ranked-choice voting or create chaos?