5,000 duplicate ballots sent out in Riverside County

Approximately 5,000 duplicate ballots were erroneously mailed to some voters in western Riverside County, the Registrar of Voters office announced on Monday.

Officials with the Registrar said a computer system error mistakenly generated duplicate mailing files for 5,000 voters. The affected voters live in the areas of Canyon Lake, Menifee, Murrieta, Wildomar, and Winchester.

The computer system error was identified over the weekend and has been fixed, however, the ballot packets were already delivered to the U.S. Postal Service, officials added.

“It is important to note that none of the duplicate ballots will result in a voter being able to cast more than one ballot,” said Registrar of Voters Rebecca Spencer. “I take election integrity seriously and apologize for the inconvenience.”

Officials said that each vote-by-mail envelope has a bar code, when the bar code is scanned as accepted at the Registrar of Voters office it automatically locks the voter’s record so that the voter can only vote once.

If a voter who received two ballots returned both ballots, only one ballot would count. The first ballot received would be processed and the second ballot would be automatically voided.

The Riverside County Registrar of Voters office recommends that any voters who receive two ballots should vote and return one of the ballots, then destroy the second ballot.

"It does not matter which ballot the voter returns as both ballots are the same," reads the announcement from the Registrar's office.

Officials added that procedures have been put in place to prevent the error in the future.

Voters with questions or concerns regarding their ballot are asked to call the Riverside County Registrar of Voters at (951) 486-7200.