Virginia on-line voter registration web site down hours earlier than the deadline

In what’s quick turning into a sample for voter registration within the 2020 presidential election, technical difficulties have befallen one other state’s voter registration web site on the final day residents can register. This time, Virginians are locked out of the power to register on-line.

As of publication time, Virginians hoping to register by way of the positioning’s internet portal must discover one other means to take action earlier than Wednesday’s 11:59 pm deadline, as the positioning says it’s “quickly unavailable” as a consequence of a “community outage” that might not come at a worse time. Guests to the web site at present get an error message saying it’s quickly unavailable however service will probably be restored “as rapidly as potential.”

The issue, in line with the state’s Data Know-how Company, is {that a} fiber optic cable offering web to the state’s Enterprise Options Heart was someway reduce, taking the voter registration web site down with it.

“A crew working in a single day on a roadside utilities mission severed fiber cables,” Krys Grondorf of Verizon instructed Recode. “It was not a Verizon crew that severed the cable — it was a county roadside utilities mission.”

“This has affected the Division’s citizen portal together with native registrar’s places of work throughout the Commonwealth,” Andrea Gaines of the Virginia Division of Elections instructed Recode. “Verizon technicians are on web site and dealing to restore the reduce; updates will probably be offered as work progresses.”

Gaines didn’t reply to questions on how the cable was reduce, how lengthy the outage is anticipated to final, or what treatments the state will present to make up for the misplaced time.

Potential voters can nonetheless register Wednesday by printing out a voter registration type and dropping it off at a voter registration workplace in individual or by mailing it (make sure that it’s postmarked October 13).

Final week, Florida’s voter registration web site crashed within the ultimate hours of registration. Whereas the Florida secretary of state initially mentioned the outage was transient, it turned out to final for a number of hours, doubtlessly stopping tens of 1000’s of registrations. The state ended up extending registration for seven hours the following day, albeit in the midst of the day and with little discover.

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