{"id":63824,"date":"2025-12-18T00:14:15","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T00:14:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/63824\/"},"modified":"2025-12-18T00:14:15","modified_gmt":"2025-12-18T00:14:15","slug":"why-does-luzerne-county-keep-having-election-problems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/63824\/","title":{"rendered":"Why does Luzerne County keep having election problems?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Votebeat is a nonprofit news organization reporting on voting access and election administration across the U.S. Sign up for Votebeat Pennsylvania\u2019s free newsletter here.<\/a><\/p>\n

A Pennsylvania county that has drawn congressional scrutiny for the way it runs elections continued to experience problems in 2025, despite a stabilization in leadership and changes aimed at preventing errors.<\/p>\n

For Luzerne County, the most populous county in northeastern Pennsylvania, the issues this year started in October with a mix-up with mail ballots that resulted in the county mistakenly sending 31 voters two ballots.<\/p>\n

The county quickly canceled the duplicate ballots and blamed the mishap on a state-run software program. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a specifically Luzerne County issue,\u201d Emily Cook, the county\u2019s election director, told the local NPR affiliate<\/a>. \u201cIt\u2019s not something that we did ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

The state, however, said the error was on Luzerne\u2019s end.<\/p>\n

Despite improvements made after a 2022 ballot paper shortage drew national attention, the county has continued to experience consistent election administration errors, raising questions about whether the county has moved beyond the high-profile mistakes of its past.<\/p>\n

Election administration is an almost entirely human-run process, so mistakes occasionally occur. In Chester County, a pollbook printing error<\/a> this November resulted in thousands of independent and third-party voters being forced to cast provisional ballots.<\/p>\n

But Luzerne\u2019s duplicate ballot mix-up was only the first of four issues to vex the county\u2019s election this fall. Furthermore, these four issues came on the heels of several other problems that have plagued the county\u2019s elections since 2020<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Some of those issues \u2014 like misspelled candidate names \u2014 have been relatively serious and threaten to undermine the public\u2019s trust in elections. But others \u2014 like issues with items in poll workers\u2019 bags of materials needed to run a voting location \u2014 have been more routine, and local officials say the county gets disproportionate criticism for them because of its checkered past.<\/p>\n

Luzerne has a history of election problems<\/p>\n

Following the turbulent 2020 election, many election offices around the country experienced a high rate of staff turnover<\/a>. A 2023 analysis by Votebeat and Spotlight PA<\/a> found that, in Pennsylvania, the more turnover there was in a county\u2019s election director and deputy election director positions, the more the county experienced errors such as ballot misspellings or equipment issues.<\/p>\n

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That was certainly true in Luzerne County. The cumulative years of experience for the top two officials in the office dropped drastically ahead of the 2020 election. Marisa Crispell, who had served as election director for several years, resigned in 2019 amid ethics questions<\/a>, and the department\u2019s long-time deputy left just before the 2020 election. A string of roughly half a dozen directors and deputy directors followed, many with little to no election administration experience.<\/p>\n

A series of missteps ensued: Ballots were labeled for the wrong party<\/a> in the 2021 primary; mail ballots transposed the candidate lists for two offices<\/a> in the 2021 municipal election; and mail ballots listed the wrong number of candidates<\/a> that fall as well. The county said their election equipment vendor was to blame for all three issues.<\/p>\n

The flubs culminated in a dramatic scene during the 2022 midterm elections, when nearly one-third of the county\u2019s precincts ran short on ballot paper on Election Day<\/a>, and the county scrambled to find more of the specific type of paper needed.<\/p>\n

The incident spawned unfounded conspiracy theories that specific precincts had been given less paper because of their political leanings, and a congressional committee later held a hearing<\/a> on the Luzerne paper shortages.<\/p>\n

Luzerne County District Attorney Sam Sanguedolce investigated the cause of the shortage and told Votebeat and Spotlight PA at the time that there was \u201cno question\u201d staff turnover was primarily to blame. No handbook was in place to teach new election directors how to do the job, and the director at the time had spent just one month as deputy director before being promoted, meaning she hadn\u2019t spent much time learning the ropes from her superior.<\/p>\n

Luzerne\u2019s problems persisted after turnover stopped<\/p>\n

After the paper shortage, leadership in the department somewhat stabilized.<\/p>\n

A previous director, Eryn Harvey, came back and led the department for the 2023 primary and general election. Then Cook, who first joined the department in 2021 and served as deputy director during the paper shortage, moved into the director\u2019s role in early 2024 after Harvey departed. That means Luzerne County\u2019s top election official now has more than four years of experience working in election administration, more than many of the other directors since 2019. <\/p>\n

However, Luzerne County\u2019s election administration problems have persisted, albeit to a lesser degree than the paper shortage. <\/p>\n

During the 2023 municipal elections, mismatched data files<\/a> resulted in the county needing to void and reissue some mail ballots. Other mail ballots were sent without secrecy envelopes<\/a>. In the 2024 general election, a candidate\u2019s name was misspelled<\/a> on ballots sent to nearly 7,000 voters.<\/p>\n

This year, beyond the duplicate ballots, Luzerne also had issues with a ballot question being incorrectly worded<\/a>, poll workers having issues with the cards needed to activate ballots<\/a> on their voting machines, and mock ballots intended for pre-Election Day equipment testing being discovered in the county\u2019s final results<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The county\u2019s election equipment vendor, the company known as Dominion Voting Systems before it was purchased by Liberty Vote<\/a> this October, has taken responsibility for some of the mistakes, such as the 2024 misspelling and the mislabeled ballots in 2021.<\/p>\n

Cook said in October that this year\u2019s ballot had gone through multiple rounds of proofreading<\/a>, yet the mistake in the wording of the ballot question went unnoticed. The county has still not provided a complete explanation of how the state\u2019s voter management system resulted in duplicate mail ballots being sent, although the Department of State did say similar issues occurred in other counties.<\/p>\n

Neither Cook nor Luzerne County Manager Romilda Crocamo responded to a request for an interview or detailed questions about these and other errors.<\/p>\n

Luzerne\u2019s election issues could be a structural problem<\/p>\n

Apart from staff turnover, Luzerne County officials pointed to a different possible culprit for the county\u2019s election woes: its unique form of government.<\/p>\n

Luzerne is a home-rule county, meaning instead of setting up county government the way most other Pennsylvania counties do, voters in Luzerne opted to create their own governing structure. Instead of putting three elected county commissioners in charge of elections, Luzerne splits election oversight duties between the county council and a board of elections with four members appointed by the council and a fifth selected by the other four members. <\/p>\n

John Lombardo, who currently chairs the Luzerne County Council, said that the stress caused by this unusual structure may also be weighing on election officials and affecting their work.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that\u2019s one of the drawbacks of the home-rule style of government we have,\u201d he said<\/p>\n

\u201cIn many cases [for] the employees of the county, they know who their boss is. But if a council member comes to them and asks them a question, they don\u2019t know what the end result of that is going to be, a policy change or what.\u201d<\/p>\n

Daren Williams, the judge of elections for Ashley Borough\u2019s second ward, agreed. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t want to be involved with that,\u201d he said. \u201cNo one with two eyes could say they don\u2019t think there\u2019s some pressure involved there.\u201d<\/p>\n

More importantly, Lombardo said, the arrangement can be confusing for the public because it\u2019s unclear where the ultimate responsibility for election administration lies.<\/p>\n

This fall, voters considered a referendum that would have changed the structure of the Luzerne County Board of Elections, but it was rejected. <\/p>\n

Officials say Luzerne\u2019s problems get outsized attention<\/p>\n

Luzerne County has garnered an outsized number of bad headlines for its election administration since 2020. But that doesn\u2019t necessarily mean it has had more problems than other counties. <\/p>\n

Lombardo said he thinks Luzerne County gets a disproportionate amount of media attention, in part due to its past problems, which he thinks contributes to a lingering perception that Luzerne County is error-prone.<\/p>\n

\u201cIs all this news reporting on Luzerne because there\u2019s so many problems in Luzerne, or is it because it is Luzerne?\u201d he asked. He added that he has heard of similar errors in other counties that didn\u2019t make the news. <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to say it\u2019s unfair, but to some extent I think a lot of the scrutiny is due to the past issues that we had, not necessarily whether the issue is serious or not.\u201d<\/p>\n

At least three newspapers or online outlets, two TV stations, and one radio station regularly cover Luzerne County, making for a higher volume of coverage than many other counties receive. Luzerne County\u2019s position in the politically important northeast part of the state means it often attracts national media coverage as well. <\/p>\n

For his part, Williams said he thinks the department has done a good job and resolved issues quickly when they do pop up. He said the consensus among other Luzerne County election judges he speaks with is that the county\u2019s ballot-marking devices are responsible for the most common issues that arise \u2014 so he\u2019s happy that the county decided this summer to switch to hand-marked paper ballots<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Lombardo also said that, following the paper shortage, the county implemented changes to hopefully avoid similar mistakes in the future. One was to create a checklist of what needs to be done and when, which the elections bureau staff, county manager, and even council members can see. <\/p>\n

He said he has been pleased with Cook\u2019s management of the department as director, and he hopes she will remain in the job.<\/p>\n

\u201cIs everything going to be perfect all the time? I don\u2019t know,\u201d he said. \u201cBut is it better than it was before? Yes, definitely.\u201d<\/p>\n

Carter Walker is a reporter for Votebeat in partnership with Spotlight PA. Contact Carter at cwalker@votebeat.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Votebeat is a nonprofit news organization reporting on voting access and election administration across the U.S. Sign up…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":63825,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[34134,14203,34131,836,34130,803,34133,34132,539,28,30,29,16512,5637],"class_list":{"0":"post-63824","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-pennsylvania","8":"tag-2025-photo-by-jason-ardan-the-citizens-voice-via-getty-images","9":"tag-ballot","10":"tag-drop-off","11":"tag-election","12":"tag-getty-editorial","13":"tag-luzerne-county","14":"tag-may-20","15":"tag-michelle-mclaughlin-of-wilkes-barre-drops-off-a-ballot-at-penn-place-for-election-day-on-tuesday","16":"tag-pa","17":"tag-pennsylvania","18":"tag-pennsylvania-headlines","19":"tag-pennsylvania-news","20":"tag-votebeat","21":"tag-voter"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63824","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63824"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63824\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63825"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63824"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}