Waukesha Co. election workers process absentee ballots by thousands
WAUKESHA, Wis. - This election boils down to one thing -- you, the voters. FOX6's Bret Lemoine spent time in Waukesha County -- normally a Republican stronghold.
18,000 absentee ballots were processed at Menomonee Falls High School. The village clerk said poll workers have been counting those ballots since 7 a.m. She made the announcement right at 8 p.m. that they were finished.
The election workers were able to process 300 ballots per hour, per machine. The clerk leased four additional machines to use on Tuesday -- in addition to the two the village already has.
Brookfield, New Berlin, and Pewaukee are the three other municipalities processing absentee votes at an alternate site.
In Brookfield, their machines can process stacks of ballots at a rapid pace. Workers there say Brookfield had about 20,000 ballots and many poll workers were done by mid-afternoon.
President Trump won Waukesha County in 2016 by pulling in 61% of the vote. But that was not as much as Mitt Romney, who swept Waukesha County in 2012 with 67% of the vote.
The GOP will no doubt be looking closely at the margin -- to see if President Trump has truly changed the Republican Party for better or worse.
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In the city of Waukesha, some waited up to an hour to cast a ballot. Many tell FOX6 News coming to vote in person was important to them.
As of Monday morning, 57% of registered voters in the county had already voted. A final tally, however, may not come until early Wednesday.
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