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Merrill: Voter turnout appears on low end of projection

By MARY SELL, Alabama Daily News

Voter turnout in Tuesday’s primary contest appeared to be just shy of 22%, according to preliminary data from the Alabama Secretary of State.

All counties had reported 100% of their voting precincts as of late on Election Day, except Jefferson County, whose latest information showed about 61% reporting.

There are also possible provisional and overseas ballots yet to be counted.

Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill on Tuesday night said turnout looked lower than his earlier projections of 28% to 32% of registered voters.

There are about 3.64 million registered voters in the state.

Asked what might have kept potential voters from the polls, Merrill said they’re burnt out on negative campaigns.

“People are tired of seeing all this negative advertising on TV, they’re ready for it to be done with it and some just didn’t participate,” Merrill said.

As counties began transmitting results to his office, Merrill said he hadn’t heard of any major issues at the polls or with a new reporting requirement that local officials use state-supplied computers to transmit results. 

Merrill said his office spent about $247,000 to get the computers to each county for election night reporting.

“These computers are designated for this use and only this use,” Merrill previously said.

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