Voting machine complaints spread online, but officials say there’s no evidence of widespread vote switching

Voters in several states have reported touchscreen issues as election officials urge people to review their ballots before submitting them.

Reports of touchscreen voting machines appearing to select the wrong candidates have spread across social media as early voting begins for the November 2026 midterm elections. Voters in Kansas, Ohio, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas have described difficulties with ballot-marking devices, with some alleging that the problems could indicate election interference.

However, election administrators interviewed by The Associated Press said they had not found evidence of widespread vote switching. Officials attributed reported problems to accidental touches, screen calibration issues or other difficulties that can generally be addressed before a ballot is submitted. The complaints have attracted significant attention online, with some posts receiving tens of thousands of likes, shares and views.

Stella Parton, sister of the late country music icon Dolly Parton, said in a Facebook post that she had to correct her selection three times at a polling location near Nashville, Tennessee, because the machine repeatedly defaulted to Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn. Parton urged voters to take their time and review their choices, warning against allowing concerns about the equipment to discourage participation.

In Williamson County, Tennessee, election administrator Chad Gray said officials had found no discrepancies in the voting equipment. Tennessee elections coordinator Mark Goins also told local station WSMV that the reported incidents did not appear to constitute vote flipping. Similar reports emerged in Kendall and Bexar counties in Texas, where voters described difficulties selecting Democratic candidates. Local election officials said they could not confirm equipment problems in those cases.

According to election administrators, ballot-marking devices can sometimes register a selection differently from what a voter intended if the person taps the wrong area of the screen or the touchscreen is miscalibrated. Staci Decker, elections administrator in Kendall County, Texas, said her office recalibrates screens periodically.

The Associated Press reported that many of the recent complaints involve ExpressVote ballot-marking devices manufactured by Election Systems & Software. The company said it had not been made aware of a widespread voting-machine problem during the current election cycle. It advised voters experiencing difficulties to seek assistance from poll workers.

David Becker, executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, told the AP that many reported vote-flipping incidents can be explained by ordinary human error. He warned that misleading claims can exploit genuine voter concerns to undermine public confidence in elections.