Ballot Processing Election Night and Beyond

Unofficial results will be posted on the following days/times (times are approximate):

Election Night – Tuesday, November 3

• 7:30 p.m.
• 8:45 p.m.**
• 10:45 p.m.
• End of night, likely around 1-1:30 a.m.

Wednesday, November 4

• 5 p.m.

Thursday, November 5

• 5 p.m.

Update 5:45 p.m. 11/5: We will do an additional posting this evening sometime after 9 p.m. plus another posting Friday, Nov 6 likely sometime after 8 p.m. (originally, listed as late afternoon).

Friday, November 6

• If needed

Friday, November 13 (day posting after Cure / Military / Overseas deadline)

• Likely mid-day 12-2 p.m.

Why not more results postings?

Pulling results from our Voting System means almost all activity must pause while we tabulate results. Fewer postings means we can process faster, especially on election night.

** State law requires us to provide at least two election results updates by 9 p.m. However, there is often very little change between the first and second updates. The first update includes all ballots received throughout the election and processed by 7 p.m. The second update includes only the ballots scanned after that first release, representing roughly one additional hour of processing

To calculate how many ballots are left to count, you can compare our Ballots Returned data* to our Ballots Counted (results) data. The difference between how many ballots have been returned and how many have already been counted provides an estimate* of how many are left to be counted.

• Ballots Returned data
• Unofficial Election Results

*The Ballots Returned data is reliant on Secretary of State data pushes, which vary. The page is updated daily from the prior day returns daily at 7 a.m. Beginning on Election Day at noon, page is updated every three hours from the SOS data. Thus, please keep in mind that on Election Night, ballot returns data has a several hour lag. Additionally, ballot returns include every ballot received, thus that figure will always be higher than what we ultimately count (e.g., not all voters cure their ballot, but their ballot will still be included in the returns data).

Overview

By law, there is an eight-day period after the election during which some ballots can still be received/counted. These include:

• Ballots received by 7 p.m. on election night that have not finished the ballot processing steps – See this ballot processing infographic for details or watch our ballot processing tour video to understand all the steps a ballot takes from receipt to counted. We can only process so many ballots a day, and when we receive many on election day, particularly in the final hours, ballot processing typically takes until Thursday or later to complete.
• Military and Overseas (UOCAVA) mail ballots – These ballots legally have until end of day on the eighth day to arrive. Historically, less than 5% of UOCAVA mail ballots are received after Election Day.
• Voters who turned in their ballots by 7 p.m. on Election Day but need to cure (i.e. resolve) an issue with their ballot envelope (e.g., signature discrepancies, missing signatures/ID) – Voters who need to cure an issue with their ballot envelope must respond with the appropriate affidavit to our office by end of business on the eighth day or via email or by using eCure by 11:59 p.m. that day.
• Ballots returned to another Colorado county clerk’s office or collected by Denver Elections from USPS at 7 p.m. – If a voter returned their ballot by 7 p.m. on Election Day to another county clerk in Colorado, the ballot is either given to us at our Wednesday county ballot exchange at Denver Elections* or is sent to us (typically via Fed Ex or similar). Of this category, we immediately process ballots received from the county exchange to include in the Wednesday or Thursday unofficial results postings, but ballots received after this immediate period are held for the ninth day to process.
• Ballots held to preserve voter anonymity – We reserve 3 ballots per precinct per district style to help preserve the anonymity for the potential cured or mail UOCAVA ballots that come in within the eight-day window.
• Manual Process ballots – Ballots that typically come in during the last 24 hours and had an issue that prevents them from immediately being processed (e.g., damaged envelope so it can’t go through the mail sorter; dirty or food-stained so it can’t go through the scanners; poorly marked so election judges need to review for voter intent). There are typically at least 500 or more of these ballots.

*At 7 p.m. on election night, Denver Election officials physically receive (on behalf of all county clerks) any Colorado mail ballots still at the main Denver USPS Mail Processing Center. These ballots are then provided to counties at the ballot exchange on Wednesday morning (or sent to counties that cannot attend, e.g. Western Slope counties). At this same exchange, attending counties that have received ballots from other counties in their drop boxes can exchange ballots.

Go Deeper!

Want to learn even more about ballot processing and what happens election night & in the days immediately after? Watch our Election Night and Beyond webinar.

Eligible ballots received during the eight-day window after the election are processed on the ninth day – Friday, November 13 (day later due to Veterans Day). We will update unofficial election results by mid-day, Friday, November 13. Typically, the results will not change after this date.

After every election, we validate election outcomes through the Risk-Limiting Audit (RLA), a statistically-based audit that uses a sample of randomly selected physical ballots and compares the votes on each of those ballots to the way the scanner read each ballot at the time of scanning. For more details about the audit, please see the Secretary of State’s Audit Center.

The RLA is open to members of the public and will be conducted on Tuesday, November 17 (round 1). We will have the next two days for contingency and/or round 2 audit dates (subject to round 1 / results of statewide RLA). Find more details and RSVP.

Certification of election results occurs during the canvass board meeting. The Canvass Board is comprised of the County Clerk or her designee along with a bipartisan team – one Republican and one Democratic representative (appointed by the local party chairs). During the meeting, staff presents data in great detail on the election results including ballots received and ballots counted, including mail ballots vs. in person. This data is also summarized in the Reconciliation Report. Certification signals that the election results are complete, accurate, and final.

This meeting is online and open to the public. The canvass meeting is set for Tuesday, November 24. More details and RSVP here.

Overview:

• A recount of any election contest shall be held if the difference between the highest number of votes cast in that election contest and the next highest number of votes cast in that election contest is less than or equal to one-half of one percent of the highest vote cast in that election contest (CRS 1-10.5-101(b)).
• A recount shall occur only after the Canvass Board certifies the original vote count.
• If a automatic recount is not required, an interested party may submit a notarized written request for a recount at the expense of the interested party. This request shall be filed with the secretary of state, the county clerk and recorder, within twenty-two days after the election.

Automatic Recount Example – Two candidate race:

Total ballots returned 10,099

• Candidate A 5,034
• Candidate B 5,065

Calculation for a recount:

• Difference between candidates = 31
• Winning candidate vote total = 5065
• Winning candidate vote difference less than < or = to .5%
• 31/5065= .006120434 or .6%

No automatic recount required

Automatic Recount Example 2: Multiple Candidate Race (top 5 win)

Total ballots returned:

• Candidate 4th place 10,213
• Candidate 5th place 8,986
• Candidate 6th place 8,861
• Candidate 7th place 8,819

Calculation for a recount:

• Difference between candidates (Candidate 5 and 6) = 125
• Winning candidate vote total = 8,986 (candidate in 5th place)
• Difference between candidates/ Winning candidate vote total less than< or = to .005 or .5%
• 125/8986= .0139105 or 1.3%

No automatic recount required