Cobb voters face ballot delays as turnout sets record

Already seen a record number of early votes and even more voters are expected to head out today. Good day. Allie Levine is live in Cobb County where there was some confusion in the days leading up to Election Day. Allie, good morning to you. What happened? Yeah, good morning. A little bit of confusion indeed. Not what you want to hear ahead of Election Day, but we do know that Cobb County, like the rest of the state, already broke early voting records despite some unexpected hurdles for voters who requested absentee ballots. They didn't arrive quite when they were supposed to. When absentee ballots were unaccounted for in Cobb County, officials looked to the third party ballot vendor, Fort Orange Press. How do you handle a third party vendor? Well, Coming out of the construction business, when you mess up big time, you didn't get the contract. The affected ballots were issued between October 7th and the 15th. Cobb says it overnighted replacement ballots to eligible voters via USPS Priority Express Mail. Those need to be received by 7 p.m. today. Voters could have mailed them or they can deliver them in person to the county elections office. You can change your mind and still vote in person if the registrar has not received it. The county, like the rest of the state, broke early voting records. According to Cobb Elections and Registration, more than 200,000 people have casted their vote in this election, which represents a 35% increase amongst our registered voters. Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger says statewide more than 2.8 million Georgians have already voted. Why are we having such huge numbers of people showing up to vote? And I think you have to really say that, number one, voters, Georgians, trust our election process. What they know, and what we have shown in the last several cycles, is our elections are free, fair, and fast. We are less than an hour away from polling locations opening up statewide. That'll happen at 7 a.m. We've already seen some poll workers head into this location here in Cobb County. It's worth noting that voting does close at 7 o'clock tonight. If you are in line at 7, you will still be able to cast your ballot. For now, reporting live in Cobb County, Allie Levine for Good Day. A big day ahead. Allie, thank you so much. And viewers, remember, Fox 5 will bring you election results as they come in at fox5atlanta.com. You can also stream live continuous coverage of the results and the candidate speeches on the Fox Local app and that will give you a two screen experience. Joanne?