In areas that hand-count votes, Scanlan says the counting process will be mostly impacted. Larger jurisdictions that utilize machines to count ordinary ballots will have to hand-count write-ins, which takes longer. He stated that local officials are hiring more personnel to speed up the census. He remarked, “I think that is a challenge that can be overcome.” “I fully expect the towns to get the volunteer resources they need to help.”
The New Hampshire primary ballot instructs write-in voters to write in a name in the ‘WRITE-IN’ field and fill in the oval opposite their choice. Scanlan recommends voters to follow these guidelines but stresses that local elections authorities must assess voter intent while evaluating ballots.
“If somebody wrote in the name of a candidate and they did not fill in the oval, that does not disqualify that vote,” he told WMUR-TV. The voter intended to write the name on the ballot. That ballot would be counted.”
New Hampshire considers votes without a darkening oval “blank.” Thus, write-in votes without an oval may be counted as “blank” instead of write-in. This would be remedied when local election authorities assess if a “blank” ballot represents a write-in vote. Scanlan said a write-in candidate's name doesn't have to be spelled correctly or in a certain way if the voter's intent is obvious.
I suppose purpose is evident if they write ‘Biden,’ I think the idea is apparent if they write ‘Bidon,’” he said in October. “If they just write ‘Joe,’ you have to wonder if there are other Joes on the ballot or running. However, you may not know which ‘Joe’ the voter is voting for.
Election authorities will update the Associated Press on unprocessed write-in votes. As local authorities sift votes overnight and in the following days, the AP will report Biden and non-Biden write-ins. Unprocessed write-ins will decrease as Biden and “Other write-ins” increase.
New Hampshire primary voters will choose between 21 Democrats and a write-in candidate on Tuesday. Republicans will host a primary with 24 declared candidates (although Republicans can vote for a write-in, the proportion is predicted to be low).
If previous history is any indication, New Hampshire Democrats may send a delegation to the Democratic National Convention this summer and vote for the nominee. The DNC first threatened to deprive Michigan and Florida of all their delegates in 2008 for holding primaries early. After talks with then-Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, it declared that delegates from both states may each vote half. The convention opened with party officials voting to give Michigan and Florida delegates full voting rights for party unity.
Last successful statewide write-in for federal office occurred in 2010, when Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski lost the Republican primary but won the general election. The final write-in vote count was unknown for two weeks after Election Day, but she earned 99%.