Ben Giles/KJZZ

Maricopa County election workers in Phoenix process early ballots by removing them from ballot envelopes to prep ballots for counting on Oct. 21, 2020.

Maricopa County is getting closer to completing its ballot counting for the 2020 election.

As of Wednesday morning, elections officials were still working through the early and provisional ballots that had to be verified.

The deadline for voters to verify their signatures on questioned ballots was Tuesday at 5 p.m. County spokeswoman Erika Flores said despite what some may think, they’re getting through the process faster than usual.

“We’ve already counted more than 2 million ballots,” Flores said. “Back in 2016, it took 10 days to count 1.6 million ballots, and in 2018 it took 14 days to count around 1.4 million ballots.” 

Pima County Communications Director Mark Evans said his office is in a similar position, working through its provisional ballots. 

“Not all provisional ballots end up being certified to be counted,” Evans said. “So I can’t really say how many of those will actually get counted. It just depends on how many meet the standards for being a legal ballot under state law.”

Both Pima and Maricopa County officials say they expect to finish counting by the end of the week.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This story has been updated to correct a typo in the number of days it took to count the vote in 2016.

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