(WICHITA, Kan.) — It was a long night for candidates and an even longer night for Sedgwick County election officials.
A computer entry error led to inaccurate returns from Tuesday's primary and a long wait for the final results.
"The percentages of the votes that I was seeing really didn't surprise me that much. But the number of votes and the number of precincts that were reporting so early was a little unbelievable," said Sedgwick County voter Dan Dickgrafe.
He wasn't alone in his confusion. The initial primary returns hit the election commission website around 8:15 p.m. They showed 257 precincts reporting, with just a small number of votes cast.
"Later into the evening I realized they'd found some sort of mistake or error and then that made it a much longer night for all of us that were watching on TV," Dickgrafe said.
Eyewitness News relies on the website to provide viewers with accurate and timely returns. So one mistake -- or in this case one checked box on a computer -- led to thousands of people being misinformed.
