Top Stories

Issues with tens of thousands of ballots in two local counties tied to third party company

CLEVELAND, Pa. — After weeks of delays, Midwest Direct said all mail-in ballots have been printed and sent out for distribution less than two weeks until Election Day, processing an unprecedented 1 million vote-by-mail ballots.

But there was little activity at the company’s headquarters in Cleveland, Ohio on Wednesday.

Channel 11 saw vans parked in the lot and tried to get answers from someone with the company but we were told no one was there at the office to talk to us.

Related >>> 11,000 Allegheny Co. voters told they’re not registered due to incorrect info

We tried calling a number listed for the CEO but never heard back.

Nine counties in Ohio have reportedly already cut ties with the company because of botched ballots and delays.

Allegheny and Westmoreland counties were plagued with issues after hiring the third-party company.

Some 29,000 ballots in Allegheny were printed wrong, and county leaders said it was the fault of Midwest Direct because of a ballot image-mapping error.

Meantime, the final batch of delayed ballots in Westmorland were expected to be sent out today, according to county commissioners.

“All 68,000 individual ballots should be hitting their mailboxes by the end of the week,” said Westmoreland County Gina Cerilli.

If you want to receive local news alerts, please download our WPXI News App. You can also follow WPXI on Facebook and Twitter.

The company also came under scrutiny for its Trump flag flying outside the office. It’s down now but local leaders questioned its partisanship when it came to printing ballots in a timely manner.

The company refuted, saying:

“Any suggestion that our personal political beliefs prompted us to slow down ballot production and distribution is absolutely false. Quite simply, we wouldn’t be in business if we conducted business that way. We know how important this election is to everyone in our country and we have kept our pledge to do everything our company can to make sure the mail-in ballot process proceeds expediently and with integrity.”

The company says it is caught up as of now and will continue processing ballots until Oct. 31.