Just one vote was changed this week after the Highland County Board of Elections completed a state-required audit of the November election.
Steve Witham, election administrator, said Tuesday that three races – president, the contested county commission race and one of the Ohio Supreme Court races – were hand counted in order to reach the 5% of votes that were required to be audited.
Witham said the audit ended up with 5.9% of the vote reviewed, and that Ohio Supreme Court candidate Pat DeWine lost a vote during the audit. The other results were unchanged. He said the audit took about four hours.
Among the audited races, in Highland County in the presidential race, Donald Trump won 14,020 votes to 3,773 for Hillary Clinton, 473 for Gary Johnson, 103 for Jill Stein and 92 for Richard Duncan.
In the contested county commissioner race, Terry Britton won with 7,599 votes to 6,024 for Alex Butler and 4,084 for Tara Campbell.
In the Highland County vote for the Jan. 2, 2017 state Supreme Court race, DeWine officially ended up with 11,240 votes to 4,138 for Cynthia Rice.
Voter turnout in Highland County was 67.95%, with 18,769 total voters. Statewide, turnout was 71.33%, according to Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted.
Last week, Husted certified the official results of the 2016 presidential General Election. In total, 5,607,641 Ohioans cast ballots, out of 7,861,025 registered voters.
“As we close the books on another election, one thing that is abundantly clear is that Ohio is a national leader in elections administration as our state once again has delivered a well-run election,” Husted said in a press release. “Despite the unwarranted predictions of a troubled election, it is clear that voters had a great experience and the 2016 Presidential Election in Ohio was free of any major problems.”
Husted noted 2016 election records, including the fact that more Ohioans cast an absentee ballot than at any election in Ohio history, and fewer Ohioans cast a provisional ballot during the 2016 presidential election than during any presidential election since 2004, the earliest year records are available.
Husted released 2016 election by-the-numbers statistics, including:
• 5,607,641 total ballots (turnout: 71.33%) were cast in 2016, compared to 5,633,246 (turnout: 70.53%) in 2012 and 5,773,777 (turnout: 69.97%) in 2008.
• Trump carried 80 of Ohio’s 88 counties.
• 1,890,069 absentee ballots were cast with 1,879,630 (99.45%) counted. This compares to 1,876,174 absentee ballots cast in 2012 with 1,862,984 (99.3%) counted. In 2008, 1,744,753 absentee ballots and 1,717,256 (98.42%) were counted. More absentee ballots were cast and a higher percentage were counted than in 2008 or 2012.
• 56.8 percent of counted absentee ballots were cast in counties won by Trump, with 43.2 percent cast in counties won by for Clinton.
• 154,965 provisional ballots were cast with 131,987 (85.17%) counted. This compares to 208,084 provisional ballots cast in 2012 with 173,785 (83.52%) counted. In 2008, 206,859 provisional ballots were cast with 166,870 (80.67%) counted. Fewer provisional ballots were cast and a higher percentage were counted than in 2008 or 2012.
• 50.3 percent of counted provisional ballots were cast in counties won by Trump, with 49.6 percent cast in counties won by Clinton.
