Macon County’s second Republican primary saw 648 people successfully cast a ballot, with four more possibly to be counted.
The special second primary happened after no candidate in two Republican party primaries got the necessary 30%, necessitating a runoff between the top two.
In Macon County, for the Republican nomination for Lieutenant Governor, Hal Weatherman got 540 votes compared to 107 for Jim O’Neill.
The Republican nomination for N.C. Auditor was closer in Macon County, with Dave Boliek getting 395 votes to 234 for Jack Clark.
Macon County’s vote mirrored statewide results, with Weatherman receiving more than 74% of the ballots and Boliek at over 53% with most ballots counted.
Out of the 648 votes, 270 were early or absentee, with the other 378 coming on Election Day. The 648 accounts for 2.85% of registered voters in the county.
All results are unofficial until the canvass, which will be at 11 a.m. on Friday, May 24. Macon County Board of Elections will decide whether to count the four provisional ballots at that time.
The elections office said Tuesday’s power outage did not affect voting, as precincts have battery backups for the voting machines.
Macon County Elections Director Melanie Thibault said there were a “few hiccups” during the day but extensive training in advance of November’s general election should rectify those issues.
Only Republicans or unaffiliated voters who chose a Republican ballot in the first primary or didn’t vote in the first primary could vote in the second primary in Macon County. Democrats or any other non-Republican party members and unaffiliated who voted on a non-Republican ballot in the first primary could not vote in the second primary in Macon County.
Thibault said there will be a hand-eye count of two Macon voting locations randomly chosen by the N.C. State Board of Elections, which will occur Thursday at 11 a.m. in the Macon Board of Elections office.
Early Voting results
During early voting, 249 ballots were cast: 181 at the Robert Carpenter Community Building in Franklin and 68 at the Highlands Civic Center.
For the 145 hours of early voting, the Carpenter Center averaged a vote every 48 minutes and Highlands had one vote every two hours and eight minutes.
Early voting in the second primary began April 25 and ran for 13 days, the same number of days allotted for the first primary.
“Early voting for the second primary went well. Slow, but we expected it to be,” Thibault said. “We used the down time to cross-train the polling officials to do other important tasks that they normally would not do and they enjoyed that. They are now trained to perform other tasks and that will definitely be helpful for the upcoming presidential election.”
Macon County had to keep early voting at those hours because none of its voting could be at the Board of Elections office. Located in the Macon County Courthouse basement, voting can’t happen at the courthouse due to the office not being ADA-compliant and the metal detectors at the entrance to the courthouse. If early voting could occur in the Board of Elections office, early voting times could have mirrored office hours.