Nearly 7,800 Tulare County voters received duplicate vote-by-mail ballots because of a vendor error during the ballot replacement process, according to county election officials. The mistake affected voters in the city of Tulare as a closely watched congressional race approaches.

The Tulare County Registrar of Voters learned about the problem Tuesday. Officials determined that 7,791 voters received duplicate ballots out of more than 227,000 registered voters across the county.

Every duplicate ballot was sent to a resident in the city of Tulare. The city has more than 34,000 registered voters, meaning the error was concentrated within a single community rather than spread throughout the county.

Tulare resident Mario Garcia discovered the duplicate ballots after checking his mail on two separate occasions. He said additional ballots were also delivered to members of his household.

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"I waited a couple of days to pick up my mail, and I picked it up on Friday, and I saw one ballot, and yesterday I went again to get the mail and I saw the other one," Garcia said.

Garcia said his wife and son each received an extra ballot as well. With the midterm election approaching, he expressed concern about how the error could be viewed in the political climate.

"Maybe the politicians will say something, and they think we will cheat," Garcia said.

Tulare County Registrar of Voters Michelle Baldwin sought to reassure voters that safeguards are in place to stop duplicate ballots from being counted. Election officials said a voter may submit only one ballot.

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"We just want to reassure our voters that no ballot will be counted twice. So you can only submit one ballot. If another ballot is counted, it will be rejected," Baldwin said.

The ballot error comes as Tulare County voters participate in the closely watched District 22 contest between Randy Villegas and David Valadao. The outcome of that race could affect the balance of power in the U.S. House.

Fresno State political science professor Dr. Thomas Holyoke said the duplicate ballots could create problems if recipients attempt to return more than one. His concern focused on the additional trouble that such attempts could cause during the ballot counting process.

"You could actually have a situation where people try to return more than one ballot. That's going to be a mess when it comes to actually counting the ballots," Holyoke said.

County officials did not publicly identify the vendor responsible for the error. Election officials said California has nine print vendors nationwide, including three located within the state, and two of those vendors work with the Tulare County elections office.

Baldwin said the print vendor accepted full responsibility for what happened. Officials also prepared a mailer that the vendor sent to affected voters after the duplicate ballots were discovered.

"The print vendor has taken full responsibility for the error, and we created a mailer that they sent out yesterday," Baldwin said.

Voters who received duplicate ballots were sent a card explaining what to do with the extra copy. Baldwin said the instructions were straightforward: "They're instructed to destroy the other ballot."

Election officials maintained that the duplicate ballots should not affect any contest or the final election results. They also warned that voting twice in the same election is considered a crime and could lead to fines.

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