Wisconsin Election Agency Confirms System ‘Outages’ on First Day of Early Voting

‘Your votes will be counted. This is just a matter of a slow down,’ the top election official in the state said.

Voters wait in line to cast their votes at an early-voting polling location at the Madison Public Library–Central in Madison, Wis., on Oct. 22, 2024. Kamil Krzaczynski/AFP via Getty Images

High turnout on Wisconsin’s first day of in-person absentee voting caused the battleground state’s election system to experience system problems and lags, officials said on Oct. 22.

People who spoke with local media outlets in Milwaukee on camera said they were waiting for several hours to vote on Oct. 22. Meanwhile, the city of Glendale, Wisconsin, wrote on social media that high voter turnout caused “severe delays” and “periodic outages.”