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Bomb threats at Perry, Clearfield county election offices prompt canvassing and delivery deadline extensions

Perry County's Board of Elections headquarters received the threat at 7:18 p.m. Tuesday. Canvassing was postponed from 8 p.m. Tuesday to 10 a.m. today.

NEW BLOOMFIELD, Pa. — Canvassing and delivery of mail-in and absentee ballots in two Pennsylvania counties -- including one in Central PA -- was postponed Tuesday night when their Board of Elections offices received bomb threats, court documents show.

Perry County Judge Kenneth Mummah ruled that canvassing at the Freedom Building in New Bloomfield should be pushed back from 8 p.m. Tuesday to 10 a.m. Wednesday after the county's Board of Elections received a bomb threat at the facility at about 7:18 p.m.

County solicitor William R. Bunt petitioned the court to postpone canvassing after the building was evacuated. Mummah granted the petition, ruling that the threat caused the Election Board to change its plans for processing precinct results, "thereby necessitating that personnel originally assigned to the canvassing process were needed to provide assistance elsewhere."

Clearfield County Judge Fredric J. Ammerman issued a similar ruling Tuesday night after the Board of Elections there received a bomb threat at 7:10 p.m. The county's administrative office was evacuated and moved to a nearby church as a precaution and surrounding roads were closed, but the threat may have caused some voters to be unable to deliver their mail-in ballots, Ammerman determined.

As a result, he issued a ruling that extended the deadline to hand-deliver mail-in ballots to 9 p.m. Tuesday, according to court documents. The ballots delivered after 8 p.m. were to be kept segregated, according to Ammerman's ruling.

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