Elections

The state Elections Division soon heads to federal court to try to clear the way for public release of Referendum 71 petitions.

You know you want to pop your head in the Elections Division door and see how all this R-71 signature check business actually works ... But since you can't (sorry, we're at our observer max down there), we're bringing the check to you. This 5-minute video shows you the basics of signature checking and gives you an idea of what our checkers are up to:

The count goes on. Washington election workers have now checked over 58,000 Referendum 71 signatures, with a rejection rate now up to about 11 percent. Almost 8,000 new signatures were added Friday evening to the tally reported by master checkers a day earlier. The new total is 58,493 checked from several hundred volumes.

Crews checking Referendum 71 signatures report they've now checked over 50,000 signatures.

Election crews have now posted the latest Referendum 71 signature-check results, adding over 15,000 checked signatures, pushing the total to over 48,000. The tally now includes 43,147 signatures accepted and 5,142 rejected, with a slightly higher rejection rate of 10.65 percent.

• Image

  
  What the heck is a "master checker"?
• Why are election workers checking every single signature submitted for Referendum 71, the "e

State election officials have released the first of a new format of daily updates for the closely watched Referendum 71 signature checks.