MIAMI 鈥� When elections officials in Palm Beach County, Florida, emailed ballots last week to military and overseas voters, they failed to notice a typographical error: The name of Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, the Democratic nominee for vice president, was misspelled as 鈥淭om Walz.鈥�
The office was made aware of the error less than 18 hours after the ballots went out, Wendy Sartory Link, the county鈥檚 elections supervisor, said Sunday.
鈥淭he error was isolated to 257 electronic ballots,鈥� she said in an email, adding that the misspelling had been 鈥渋mmediately corrected.鈥� The affected voters were emailed a recommendation to download the updated ballot, she said.
The New York Times learned of the error from a concerned voter overseas who sent the newspaper a screenshot of her misspelled ballot. The voter said she had contacted Link鈥檚 office but not yet received a response.
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Link 鈥� a Democrat whose reelection bid is on the ballot 鈥� said her office had sent an 鈥渁ccurate ballot file鈥� to its vendor. The vendor then made a 鈥渕anual typed change鈥� to the ballot and 鈥渋ncorrectly typed 鈥楾om鈥� instead of 鈥楾im.鈥欌��
鈥淭he elections office was never notified of the manual change,鈥� she said.
She said that the error would not affect the counting of the votes. 鈥淭he error in no way affects the proper tabulation of any of the electronic ballots and every vote will count as the voter intended,鈥� Link said. 鈥淭his error does not affect any other military and overseas ballots or domestic ballots.鈥�
During the 2000 presidential election recount, Palm Beach County became notorious for its 鈥渂utterfly ballot,鈥� which listed candidates on both sides of the ballot, with voters required to punch a corresponding hole in the middle. But the order of candidates listed did not align with the holes to punch.
After the election, many voters said 鈥� and data showed 鈥� that they had intended to vote for then-Vice President Al Gore, the Democrat, but had instead voted for Pat Buchanan, the Reform Party candidate.
Florida determined the outcome of the 2000 election, with George W. Bush beating Gore by fewer than 600 votes.
This article originally appeared in . 漏 2024 The New York Times
