Virginia County Finds 4K Misreported Votes From 2020

Former President Trump complains often about the results of the last presidential election, with no evidence to back up his claims, but in one part of Virginia, it's current President Biden who could have a valid beef. Per the Hill, officials in Prince William County have revealed that about 4,000 votes were misreported in that 2020 race, with Biden getting the short end of the stick. A Thursday letter from the county's Office of Elections noted that the mistake was "presumably a consequence of the results tapes not being programmed to a format that was compatible with state reporting requirements." The letter adds that "attempts to correct this issue appear to have created errors."

It shows that Trump received 2,327 more votes than he should have, while Biden was deprived of an additional 1,648 votes that should've been his. Not that these votes would've turned the tide of the election in Prince William: Biden still won handily there, with an original tally of 142,863 votes for him versus 81,222 votes cast for Trump; the new votes simply put Biden over the top even more. There were reporting errors involving US Senate and House candidates as well, though those errors similarly didn't make a dent in those races' outcomes. "The reporting errors did not consistently favor one party or candidate but were likely due to a lack of proper planning, a difficult election environment, and human error," the letter notes.

It adds that the small number of erroneous votes came out to be less than the 1% of the total, the benchmark needed to trigger a recount. Per the AP, this revelation comes just days after prosecutors working for the state's attorney general dropped charges against Michele White, the county's former registrar who'd been charged in 2022 with corrupt conduct, making a false statement, and neglect of duty. It's not clear why those charges have been dismissed. Eric Olsen, Prince William's new elections chief, says that changes have since been implemented to try to prevent such an error from happening again. "Mistakes are unfortunate but require diligence and innovation to correct," he notes in the elections office letter. (More Virginia stories.)