2022 General Election in Will County: a final day for voting Tuesday

Election Day voting starts at 6 a.m. and runs until 7 p.m. Tuesday, and officials say they are preparing for the possibility of trouble while hoping they won’t find any.

Lines seen Monday on the last day of early in-person voting were signs of heavy turnout for an election in which voters will pick a governor in Illinois, help determine the direction of Congress for the last two years of the Biden administration, and decide state legislative seats and county offices.

There have been no indications of voter harassment at the polls in Will County, although there is some uneasiness given national attention to the issue, Will County Clerk Lauren Staley-Ferry said Monday.

“We’ve been very lucky – knock on wood and cross our fingers,” Staley-Ferry said.

In addition to luck, the county clerk has contacted police to plan preventatives measures on Election Day.

“We have reached out to all the local municipalities and police chiefs to ask them if they could have extra patrol men and patrol women come around the polling places tomorrow,” Staley-Ferry said. “With everything in the news, we just want our election judges to be as comfortable as possible.”

Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul on Monday announced that more than 170 teams of assistant attorneys general and investigators from his office will monitor elections statewide “to ensure that voters’ rights are protected and polling places are accessible.”

Raoul urged voters to call his office if they suspect improper or illegal activity. The number for the Chicago area and northern Illinois is 1-866-536-3496.

Will County State’s Attorney James Glasgow on Monday put out the Election Fraud Hotline number for his office: 815-727-8872.

Glasgow, in a news release, said his office has two-person teams, each consisting of an assistant state’s attorney and an investigator, that will travel to polling places where irregularities are reported on Election Day.

“I urge anyone who sees inappropriate activity, such as passing out campaign literature or other acts of electioneering either inside or too close to polling places, to call the hotline I have established,” Glasgow said in the release.

Much of Will County has already voted without incident.

As of the end of Sunday, nearly 73,000 people in Will County had already cast a vote.

Those numbers would go up Monday with lines seen at early-voting stations, including one at the Joliet Public Library Black Road Branch.

Early ballots include nearly 41,000 cast in person and nearly 33,000 sent by mail.

Another 13,000 ballots had been mailed out to voters upon request and not yet returned as of the end of Sunday.

Mail-in ballots can still go in the mail on Tuesday, but that’s the last day.

“The vote by-mail ballot has to be postmarked by Nov. 8,” Staley-Ferry said.

With heavy voting on Monday and 13,000 mail-in ballots still out, pre-Election Day voting appears likely to top 80,000.

But there’s still plenty of vote to turn out on Election Day.

Will County has more than 462,000 registered voters, meaning only about 15% of the county had voted as of the end of Sunday.

If lines are long Tuesday, Raoul reminded voters that anyone who is line when the polls close at 7 p.m. still has the right to vote.

“I am working closely with partners in law enforcement and fellow state attorneys general to ensure everyone has safe access to the polls,” Raoul said in a written statement. “Voters have the right to cast a ballot free from intimidation or harassment, and nothing less will be tolerated.”