Harris County signals delay in vote counting to Texas Secretary of State, might not make deadline

Election officials in Harris County alerted the Texas Secretary of State's Office Tuesday they're experiencing delays in vote counting, and they might not make deadline.

HARRIS COUNTY, Texas (KXAN) — Election officials in Harris County alerted the Texas Secretary of State's Office Tuesday they're experiencing delays in vote counting, and they might not make deadline.

In Texas, all counties are required to report early and Election Day results within 24 hours of polls closing — that would make the deadline for this election 7 p.m. on Wednesday.

Texas Secretary of State John Scott said in a statement Tuesday night he's "closely monitoring" the progress being made in Harris County, and his office "stands ready to assist" officials there to get results in on time.

Scott said Harris County officials told his office the delays in ballot counting are due to damaged ballot sheets that must be duplicated before they can be scanned.

According to Texas Election Code, not meeting the results reporting deadline is a Class B misdemeanor, and ballot tabulation must be done continuously until all ballots are counted.

While early and Election Day results have that 24-hour deadline, Texas law allows provisional ballots and corrected mail-in ballots to be counted up to six days after Election Day, according to the SOS' office.

You can read the full statement from Scott below.

"We are closely monitoring the progress of ballot tabulation in Harris County to ensure all relevant election laws are followed and that legitimately cast ballots by Harris County voters in both the Democratic and Republican Primary Elections are counted accurately and timely," Scott said in a statement. "Harris County election officials have indicated to our office that the delay in ballot tabulation is due only to damaged ballot sheets that must be duplicated before they can be scanned by ballot tabulators at the central count location. Our office stands ready to assist Harris County election officials, and all county election officials throughout the state, in complying with Texas Election Code requirements for accurately tabulating and reporting Primary Election results. We want to ensure that all Texans who have cast a ballot in this year's Primary Elections can have confidence in the accuracy of results."

KXAN's continuing coverage of Election Night results can be found here.

This is a developing story that will be updated with more details as they become available.