Milwaukee will need to recount about 31,000 absentee ballots after a “sealing error” may have destabilized the counting process, city spokesman Jeff Fleming said Tuesday night. told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Caroline Reinwald, a spokeswoman for the Milwaukee Board of Elections, said the door on the city’s vote tabulation machine did not close properly. said Sentinel.

Fleming said the recount could extend the final tally by one to three hours. (Related article: ‘Software glitch’: Widespread voting problems reported in two heavily Republican battleground counties)

“There is no reason to believe that there was any compromise on any of the machines,” Fleming told the newspaper, noting that the recount was an “out of an abundance of caution.”

“But since they were not fully sealed and it was human error and were not fully sealed, we are going to zero them all out again and redo the balances that were already processed.” Fleming concluded.

BREAKING: The City of Milwaukee plans to recount approximately 30,000 absentee ballots that had already been counted.

There was an issue with one tabulator not being sealed. As a precaution, the city plans to recount each ballot. The long night has become even longer

— AJ Bayatpour (@AJBayatpour) November 5, 2024

Milwaukee Republican Party Chairman Hilario DeLeon era said Two Republican National Committee officials called it “unacceptable” and said they did not believe anything “wrongful” led to the mistake.

“All day long, we monitored the slow vote-counting operations in Milwaukee.” RNC Chairman Michael Whatley and co-chair Lara Trump said in a statement posted to X: “Our legal team… After learning that the count had been conducted under unstable conditions, the city had to significantly extend the count schedule and start over.”

“This is an unacceptable example of incompetent election administration in a key battleground state. Voters deserve better, and we urge Milwaukee city officials to do their jobs and count votes quickly and efficiently. “Anything more undermines voter trust,” the statement concluded.

🚨🚨🚨 Throughout the day, we watched slow vote-counting operations in Milwaukee.

This time, our legal team learned that the count took place under unsafe conditions, forcing the city to start over and significantly extending the count schedule.

This is unacceptable…

— Lara Trump (@LaraLeaTrump) November 5, 2024

Milwaukee is the largest city in Wisconsin and one of seven major battleground states widely viewed as battlegrounds in the presidential election.