BOE will start counting ballots 10 days before the election

Someone we know asked this question today: will ballots be counted right away? Or do you they have to wait until election day? The answer is they will start counting 10 days before. It’s a good thing because under the Governor’s Executive Order 177, County Clerks have to be done counting and transmit the results to the Secretary of State by November 23. That’s only 30 days to count more than 4 million votes (3.9 million people voted in the 2016 election; as of September 2020, there were 6,245,885 registered voters in New Jersey).