COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina’s elections website went down Monday, the first day of the state’s two-week early voting period, due to a large increase in web traffic.
SCVOTES.gov began experiencing loading issues sometime before 9:30 a.m., and as of 11 a.m., remained inaccessible. State elections officials are working to restore access, but didn’t immediately provide an estimate of when the site might be back up and running.
“On behalf of the South Carolina Election Commission, I apologize for the website issues South Carolinians are facing today.” Elections Commission Executive Director Howard Knapp said in a statement. “Our team is working diligently to ensure website access is restored and the issues do not persist into the future.”
In the meantime, the Election Commission has shared information about early voting on its social media pages, where voters can find a list of early voting sites, check their registration status and review a sample ballot.
Early voting centers are open from 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Saturday between Oct. 24 and Nov. 5. All 46 counties have at least one early voting site and most have between two and seven centers where residents can vote early without an excuse.
The agency’s website issues have no impact on voters’ ability to cast ballots in person starting Monday and do not compromise the integrity of the election, elections officials said.
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