Puerto Rico’s primary election on Tuesday has been marred by allegations of voting machine malfunctions, with hundreds of votes reportedly miscounted due to software issues with Dominion Voting Systems machines. According to the Associated Press, the miscount stemmed from a software problem that caused machines to incorrectly calculate vote totals.
Dominion Voting Systems confirmed that the issue arose from digital files used to export results from the machines. The primary election was held to determine the candidates for the island’s gubernatorial race, with at least 6,000 Dominion Voting Systems machines used in the vote.
Both the Popular Democratic Party and the New Progressive Party reported hundreds of ballots showing inaccurate results, with the PNP reporting over 700 errors and the PPD pointing to some 350 discrepancies. The elections commission conducted an audit of paper receipts from the ballot-tabulating machines.
The interim president of Puerto Rico’s elections commission, Jessika Padilla Rivera, expressed concern that the issue could undermine public confidence in the voting process ahead of the general elections in November. Puerto Rico’s Ombudsman, Edwin GarcÃa Feliciano, called for the governor and federal authorities to create a plan to avoid a similar scenario in November.
Independent presidential hopeful Robert F. Kennedy has raised concerns about the issue, stating that if he wins, he would require paper ballots. “What happens in jurisdictions where there is no paper trail?” Kennedy asked. “US citizens need to know that every one of their votes were counted, and that their elections cannot be hacked. We need to return to paper ballots to avoid electronic interference with elections.”
Billionaire Elon Musk echoed Kennedy’s post, stating that electronic voting machines should be eliminated due to the risk of hacking. “The risk of being hacked by humans or AI, while small, is still too high,” Musk said.
