CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas —
TRACKING VOTER COMPLAINTS IN THE COASTAL BEND
7:20AM: Complaint from viewer reported on social media
- Complaint: Polls are supposed to open at 7am, but doors at McDonald Library were not opened until 7:20am.
- Finding: Officials on location confirm 3News the doors at the McDonald Library did open a few minutes late. They tell 3News they do not believe this led to any other issues for voters. Nueces County Elections Clerk Kara Sands says she is looking into this claim.
7:34AM: Complaint from viewer reported on social media
- Complaint: "Church at Yorktown and Cimmaron doesnt have oh so important power cord for printer. So I went to elementary school 7600 block of Cimmaron, and no internet. Make that 82 stations, because 2 are INOP! They had months, years to prepare! Ridiculous and Unsatisfactory."
- Finding: 3News looked into this complaint and were told by election officials on location that, yes, they did have an issue with power cords this morning. Officials on location tell us the issue was quickly resolved and did not cause any issues with the process.
You can share your experience with 3News by TEXTING us at 361-855-6307
Did you experience an issue at the polls? Do you think you need to file a complaint concerning the election process? Here's what you need to do!
If you have an issue at the polls, you should immediately alert your county elections office.
During early voting, 3News received a few complaints from folks concerned about curbside Voting and even election machines not working correctly.
3News was informed that over 7000 people decided to vote on the first day of early voting. And you know with all those people heading to the polls there’s bound to be a complaint or two. 3News spoke with Nueces County Elections Office on how they’re handling some of those complaints and how they will try to solve any other problems in the future.
Nueces County Democratic Party cCairman Coretta Graham sent 3News these two complaints about early voting.
1. Lack of Information for curbside voting. We have disabled and elderly who want to vote and have no direction
2. Voting machines not working (we have machines not properly set up at various locations such as New Life Church) we need tech support to visit every location. This is a Nightmare.
3News then turned those over to Kara Sands the chief elections officer for the county.
“We got a complaint and we sent a tech over there and we said 'hey, make sure everything’s okay over at new life' and he said 'yeah, there was just a lot of people wanting to curbside vote,'” said Nueces County Chief Elections Officer, Kara Sands.
Sands tells 3News that the first day of early voting went well. Sands says the complaint about Curbside Voting seems to be a result of so many people choosing to vote that way.
“What we’re having a lot of is people just wanting to curbside and when you curbside vote if you have a physical disability that prevents you from entering a polling location without assistance and in doing so it would injure yourself or if you’re COVID and you’re symptomatic so what we’re having we’re having people calls from judges saying we’re getting carloads of people that they just don’t wanna come in and wait in line,” said Sands.
Sands added that if anyone out there has a complaint about the elections here are the ways to make sure that complaint will be heard.
“I guess it depends on what it is so if it’s because someone wearing a mask that they should be wearing maybe it has a mask that has a candidate on it or a shirt then let the election judge know then they can actually call our office and will also call the clerk out there as well,” said Sands “There is an official complaint form that they can print off our website.”
If you have a complaint about anything related to the elections, you can speak with an election judge at the polling site or call the county election office. If you don’t want to do either one of those options, you can fill out an online complaint form that can be found on the county’s election website.