Sen. Sherrod Brown and former Gov. Bob Taft say Ohio results will be known on Election Day (VIDEO)

Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and former Republican Gov. Bob Taft think Ohioans will know voting results on election night. In a call pushing election information and the need for more poll workers, Brown said early votes in Ohio are generally processed first, meaning they're ready to be run through the counter right after the polls close. Unless the presidential race is within half a percentage point, Brown said Ohio should know its results by 10 or 11 p.m. Mail-in ballots that are postmarked by Nov. 2 can be counted up to 10 days after the election. Brown said that that's usually a small number of votes. Lorain County Board of Elections Director Paul Adams has said that with residents receiving absentee ballots in the mail, many voters have chosen to return ballot packets by hand to the drop box, rather than send them through the mail. The number of people early voting throughout the state will help put a little less pressure on the election system Nov. 3, Brown said. Lorain County has set records with its in-person early vote totals, a trend reflected around the state. "This is an unprecedented election," Taft said. "I'm amazed that over a million people have already voted early, many of them standing faithfully in line socially distanced, of course. With all the absentee ballots, mail-in ballots that have been requested, all the early voting, it's going to be over half your votes are going to be cast not on Election Day. So, it really is unprecedented." Absentee ballots were delayed when Midwest Direct, a Cleveland-based company hired by 16 Ohio counties and two in Pennsylvania to print and send out official election mail, fell behind. Roughly 30,000 Lorain County ballots were backlogged. Brown said he was concerned about the delay, but that it's up to the boards of election and the Secretary of State -- a job he used to hold himself -- whether Midwest Direct loses its contract. "I'm distressed by it because he didn't do the job he was hired to do and it's caused people to have to wait to get their ballots," Brown said. "I don't know if that means some people won't get to vote that planned to vote and did everything right. But they need to deal with this contractor in the right way." Brown couldn't say if he thought the delay was politically motivated. He said he doesn't have enough information to make that judgment, but "I just know that the ballots didn't get done in time and should have been sent out more promptly," he said. Also, Republicans have anonymously told The Atlantic that the Trump campaign has discussed the possibility of asking Republican-controlled legislatures to appoint their own electors, regardless of the final vote tally. The Electoral College and its delegates formally elect the president of the United States after the Nov. 3 election. Ohio, which has a Republican-controlled legislature, does not have penalties for what are called "faithless electors," meaning they do not vote for whom they said they would. But Brown said he doesn't see that being an issue in Ohio. At least in his lifetime, he said he's never seen an elector stray in the state, and Brown said he doesn't think it will happen this year, either. Brown and Taft both stressed that people should go vote, particularly with the different options available and in this election year. Taft said that a lot of the races will be "extremely close" and Ohio could be pivotal in the presidential election. Contact Laina Yost at 329-7121 or lyost@chroniclet.com.