SALT LAKE CITY — Lt. Governor Deidre Henderson is standing by her decision to not release election results until everyone in line at in-person polling locations had a chance to cast a ballot.
"We wouldn’t do anything differently in terms of releasing results. It's an unfortunate delay but an understandable one," she told reporters on Wednesday. "You want voters who are already in line to be able to cast their ballots without undue influence."
Her decision to delay election reporting results led to some anxious moments for candidates and the public as results didn't start coming in until after 10 p.m.
FOX 13 News found long lines at voting centers statewide. While the Lt. Governor said the majority of Utahns utilized ballots mailed to them, there were still thousands who turned out to vote in person. She added it does not appear to be more than normal for in-person voting in Utah during a presidential election cycle.
"There were a high number of provisional and same-day voters. I attribute that to students, first-time voters who are wanting go vote. I attribute that to a lot of population growth in Utah over the last four years," Henderson said. "There’s a lot of reasons and we’ll be digging into that to see why there’s so many people in lines. I will say our clerks really do a good job of trying to plan the best they can. I have to commend them, I commend the voters."
Overall, Election Day voting went smoothly, Henderson said.
A white powder threat at a Salt Lake County ballot processing center briefly delayed things and Henderson said it remained under investigation by law enforcement.
There were frustrations expressed online by some who saw races projected by national news media outlets while Utahns were still in line and actively voting. The outlets utilized their own methods of exit polling and modeling data to call high-profile races in the absence of actual results.
Governor Spencer Cox was critical of the news organizations' decision to call Utah races while voters were still in line.
"They should not do that. I don’t know why they do that," he said.
While many voters waited up to two hours to cast a ballot on Election night, one place in particular had increased problems. Utah County, which still utilizes paper ballots instead of electronic voting machines, ran out of ballots at numerous polling places. Then printers ran out of ink.
"I wasn’t prepared," Utah County Clerk Aaron Davidson told FOX 13 News on Tuesday night. "But you know, we were prepared based on the information we had. It’s just a lot of people decided 'I'm voting in person.'"
Davidson, who has pushed in-person voting over mail-in balloting, said the situation "caught us off guard and I take responsibility for not spending a lot of money in preparing for something we had no idea it was going to be this big."
Utah County Commissioner Amelia Powers Gardner (who was county clerk prior to being elected to the commission) blasted Davidson for his judgment.
"I think it's clear Aaron Davidson has failed. This is not unprecedented turnout. He was unprepared," she told FOX 13 News.
Last week, the commissionercalled for Davidson to step aside from overseeing the election, accusing him of bias. The clerk is also under investigation by the Utah County Attorney's Office over accusations he improperly tracked some elected officials' ballots. Davidson previously denied any wrongdoing in an interview with FOX 13 News, insisting any information he obtained was publicly accessible.
Henderson said she would not criticize all the election workers in Utah County who have put in long hours to ensure people exercised their right to vote.
"There was some lack of planning on the part of the clerk that I think, you know, caused some problems that were unnecessary," she said. "And we’ll be addressing that moving forward."
