DETROIT — The Board of State Canvassers has began the process of reexamination of the thousands of Detroit write-in ballots from the Aug. 6 Mayoral Primary, after a unanimous vote on Tuesday, August 27 allowed state workers to open certain ballot boxes and begin re-examining write-in ballots for mayor.

The move is an effort to finalize the primary election results for mayor, after Detroit City officials and Wayne County officials disputed over vastly different voting totals for the top two candidates, Mike Duggan and Benny Napoleon. 

Shortly following the elections on August 6, the City announced that write-in candidate Mike Duggan had taken the lead for mayor, with over 46 percent of the vote totals. In this count, Napoleon was placed as a distant runner up with 30 percent of the vote.

However, last week the County announced a modified version of those results, claiming that Napoleon had actually been in first with 41 percent of the vote, while Duggan trailed with 30 percent of the vote. The drastic result difference is believed to have been over a decision to not count votes that weren’t marked with hash tags by poll workers.

Regardless of that decision, the state board rejected the county’s results, and proclaimed that it would be looking into the voting totals in detail, to determine a correct primary election result.

“This is not a recount,” Michigan Elections Director Christopher Thomas said. “We do not have certified elections results yet. Once we have those, then the recount process can commence.”

According to early findings, the State has already found mistakes made by both the City of Detroit and Wayne County when looking into the details of the vote counts. Still, according to Thomas, the State is not likely to throw out the votes that were dismissed in the county, as a previous Supreme Court ruling from another case had ruled that votes cannot be disqualified because of poll worker errors.

The Board of State Canvassers is a four-member board with two Democrats and two Republicans. They have until September 3 to complete its review and certify the election results, or else the matter would likely move forward to the Supreme Court.