Coding problem briefly affects electronic voting machines in San Mateo County

SAN MATEO COUNTY (BCN) —  A coding problem affected about 140 electronic voting machines throughout San Mateo County Tuesday morning, but the issue was resolved in about 90 minutes, according to a county election official.

The problem was identified at about 7 a.m. — an hour before polls opened for Election Day — on some Hart InterCivic “eSlate” machines used by the county, assistant chief elections officer Jim Irizarry said.

The issue was with passcodes that connected individual machines to the central processing unit at election headquarters in San Mateo, Irizarry said.

The issue was resolved by 8:30 a.m. and during the time the electronic machines were down, people were still able to vote via paper ballots, he said.

There were a few minor hardware issues later in the day but Irizarry said shortly before polls closed at 8 p.m. that overall “the rest of the day has gone relatively smoothly.”