MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – With just a week before Election Day, Miami-Dade County’s Elections Department is responding to a troubling incident caught on camera involving a ballot box that was found on a Miami-Dade road after falling from an unlocked truck.
The mishap, which led to the termination of a county election worker, has sparked local concerns and prompted statements from election officials.
The incident unfolded around 9:30 p.m. to 10 p.m. as the worker was leaving the South Dade Regional Library upon the conclusion of early voting, when a sealed bin and a sealed bag, both containing ballots from early voting, slipped off the back of a moving elections truck on Monday night.
6 p.m. report:
According to Miami-Dade Elections, the employee responsible had failed to lock the truck’s rear door, allowing the secured ballot containers to fall onto the street.
Cellphone video obtained by Only in Dade quickly circulated on social media, showing the ballot bin and bag lying in the road. In the video, several people who witnessed the fall gathered the items and took them to a local police department.
“It was an unfortunate human error on the part of one of our workers,” said Miami-Dade Supervisor of Elections Christina White. “When they were pulling out of one of our early voting locations last night, they are charged with bringing back voted ballot bins and other election material to elections headquarters, and unfortunately they just forgot to lock the back of the truck. And so, when they were pulling out of the early voting site, the door opened, and one ballot bin and one bag had fallen out of the truck.”
White praised the residents who saw the materials fall and acted quickly.
“We were very fortunate that there were upstanding residents that happened to see this unfold, and they did the responsible thing and turned it into the local Miami-Dade Police Department,” White said, adding that the items were secure. “There were seals on both the bin and the bag, so we were able to confirm here that they were intact… and there were no contents inside that were either damaged or tampered with.”
Inside the sealed bin were paper ballot backups from one of nine voting machines at the South Dade Regional Library. White emphasized that votes had already been electronically tabulated and counted, with the paper ballots stored as a backup.
“These represented the ballots that went into one of those units,” she explained. “That ballot is put in there, the votes are tabulated and counted, and so the paper ballots fall into a bin. And at the end of each night, we close up the bins, we seal them up, and we bring them back to the elections department. So I want to put voters’ minds at ease that their votes were counted, they were cast and counted accurately.”
The sealed bag contained one provisional ballot, which had yet to be reviewed for eligibility.
“This was just another bag that had a provisional ballot, one provisional ballot in it, that would come back and be reviewed for accuracy and eligibility to determine whether or not we are going to accept it,” White clarified.
White said that, while the incident was unprecedented, the worker responsible was fired.
“The employee was absolutely distraught over it, but in the elections field, we have zero tolerance for error. All our procedures were reiterated to all of our workers who do this job,” she added. “I really just want voters to feel confident to come out and vote.”
“This is the first time we have had anything like this happen,” White added. “Everything was brought back as it should be — sealed, tamper-free — you should feel confidence in your vote.”
White further reassured the public by noting that every election in Miami-Dade County undergoes an audit.
In a statement, Miami-Dade Elections credited the witnesses, calling them “upstanding citizens” who “did the right thing” by promptly turning in the misplaced ballot items.
Once the ballot box and bag arrived at the Miami-Dade Police Department’s South District Station, elections staff inspected them and verified that all seals remained intact.
Elections officials were quick to assure the public that the integrity of the ballots was upheld and that procedures for ballot handling would continue to be strictly monitored.
Artist Chire “VantaBlack” Regans, known for her work honoring victims of gun violence, expressed unease after a ballot bin fell off an elections truck near her early voting site, the South Dade Regional Library.
“Because we are about to go vote now, it is important to understand and be confident that your vote is going to count,” Regans said.
Early voter Virginia Gutierrez said White’s explanation eased her concerns.
“They can see the ballot against the electronically sent information — I won’t worry,” Gutierrez said.
Despite this incident, election officials urged voters to have confidence in the safety of their ballots. They say their staff is trained to handle ballots with extreme care, and processes are in place to avoid similar issues.
Miami-Dade voters can click here to check the status of their ballot.