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Due to a high volume, the tallying of write-in votes from Luzerne County’s May 21 primary election will continue Tuesday, county Election Director Marisa Crispell said Friday.
But according to George Brown, candidate for mayor in Wilkes-Barre, he’s got the Republican write-in nomination secured.
Inspectors and clerks tallied results from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Friday in the county election office without breaking for lunch, Crispell said. Under election law, the write-in tally must begin during the official count the Friday after the election.
Brown, who secured the Democratic nomination for mayor over incumbent Tony George earlier this week by 2,720 votes to 848 according to Tuesday’s unofficial count, was watching that process on Friday, and he said the numbers go in his favor.
“It’ll be George Brown against George Brown,” he joked. “That’s good news for George Brown!”
Brown said he received 485 write-in votes on the Republican side, compared to Mayor George, who received 108 write-in votes. That would all but assure a victory for Brown come November.
“It makes me feel wonderful, the fact that people have faith in me,” Brown said.
However write-in winners won’t be publicly announced by the office until it has finished the tally and entered the information into a database needed to generate letters informing the victors, Crispell said.
Nominees must compete and submit acceptance paperwork for their names to appear on the November general election ballot, she said.
Most of Friday’s tally focused on races in many of the county’s 76 municipalities that will be determined by write-ins because no contenders appeared on the primary ballot, Crispell said.
When the count resumes at 9 a.m. Tuesday, workers will tally names written in for school district and county races.
Two of six Republican nominations for county council were blank on the ballot and will be filled by write-in winners.
No Democrat appeared on the ballot in the county district attorney’s race. Incumbent Republican District Attorney Stefanie Salavantis was unopposed and won her party’s primary nomination, but both Salavantis and attorney Daniel Hunter sought the Democratic write-in nomination.
Crispell said the write-in tally is a cumbersome, manual process.