Texas election results likely to be final before midnight Tuesday
DALLAS - Election Day is less than 24 hours away. It may be longer than that before we know the winner of the presidential election. But we should know the outcome for all of the Texas races on Tuesday.
Even with all the vote count scrutiny, former Texas Secretary of State John Scott thinks we will have the final Texas results before midnight.
"Our elections are fair, safe, and secure," Scott said.
More than 9 million Texans voted early in person or by mail. In counties like Dallas, Tarrant, Collin, and Denton, those ballots are already being processed.
State law allows counties with more than 100,000 residents to start early.
"They will have those tabulated and ready for distribution. Those will be the first ones you will see from our counties," Scott said.
When the polls close at 7 p.m., election workers will secure the voting equipment if no one is still in line. The ballots will then be brought to each county’s vote count center.
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"Anybody can watch that online. They can watch how they are handling these ballots to give trust in our system," Scott said.
Depending on the county, some election officials said their county tabulation webpage will update every 30 minutes.
Results will also be sent to the Secretary of State website. But county websites will have the earliest reports.
Scott confirmed that the machines are not connected to the internet. They cannot be manipulated by anyone outside of Texas or anywhere else.
"Our election systems are never during the election process connected to the internet, ever. They go through a logic and accuracy test and a software test before the election process starts," he said.
How North Texas' early voting numbers compare to past elections
Early voting in Texas wrapped up Friday with nearly 9 million voters opting to use the two-week period to cast a ballot.
When asked if he thinks there is any illegal voting going on, Scott said there have been instances. But he also said there’s no evidence of widespread voter fraud in Texas or in any other states.
"Is one too many? Yea, that is one problem with the system. They need to be batting 1,000 and all of these elections administrators try and do their best to bat 1,000. Does that mean somebody doesn’t sneak into the system and do something wrong? No, I am sure that probably happens. We were not aware of it and when we found out anything inappropriate, we did everything we could to make sure it does not happen again," he said.
So when will we know the final results of the presidential election?
"Pennsylvania has updated their operations. They’ve got better devices to count their mail-in ballots. Hopefully we will know something final that day. I feel comfortable we will know by 11 p.m. how Texas voted if not way before then," Scott said.