King County Elections expects initial results Tuesday from about 1 million ballots

King County Elections expects to post results for approximately 1 million ballots when it releases initial results of the Nov. 3 election on Tuesday night.

“With our projection set at 90% or about 1.3 million ballots returned, that initial report will include a higher percentage of results than we normally expect to post,” King County Elections officials said Monday in an email. “That is largely due to the early returns we’ve seen across the county and the long hours and weekends that our ballot processing staff have put in over the last few weeks to keep up with processing those early returns.”

King County staff expects to have the majority of the vote counting wrapped up by Friday, Nov. 6 and will continue to count every eligible vote through certification on Nov. 24.

Election officials have not adjusted their 90% projection turnout.

“We do not adjust our official projection after voting has begun,” according to county staff. “We are projecting 90% turnout for this election – a record by far, beating the previous record of 85% set in 2012. A 90% turnout equates to approximately 1.3 million ballots returned out of our over 1.4 million registered voters.”

Elections staff said it’s possible the turnout could exceed 90%.

“We are prepared to pick up hundreds of thousands more ballots from drop boxes and we are ready to process every eligible ballot that is returned to us on time, including those with the on-time Nov. 3 postmark per state law,” according to elections staff.

King County Elections plans to post initial results at about 8:15 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 3.

“We generally look to have those results up by about 8:15 p.m. but please be patient as we will get them up as quickly as possible and it’s a big file this time around,” according to staff. “If we encounter anything that makes us think it will be much later than that, we will post to social media (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram @kcelections).”