MONROE, Wis. — Green County officials are reviewing how election results are transmitted after a technical failure Tuesday night prevented the county from accessing results sent electronically by local election officials and delayed the posting of unofficial partisan primary totals.

The delay quickly became part of a much larger election-night conversation, drawing discussion in the early-morning hours on X, Reddit and elsewhere online as Green County remained among the last counties to report complete results. At the same time, a separate reporting problem in Milwaukee delayed roughly 28,000 absentee ballots, helping keep the closely watched Democratic governor’s primary unresolved well past midnight. 

The problem surfaced around 9 p.m., when the Green County Clerk’s Office determined that its server equipment and results reporting program were not communicating properly. Results had been transmitted by municipalities, but they arrived in encrypted files county staff could not access or open.