Polling centers closed their doors at 5:00 PM across El Salvador today, but the CISPES and National Lawyers Guild team remains inside with the poll workers, documenting the ballot count.

Voting Day proceeded in an orderly and uneventful fashion throughout most of the country. CISPES observers noted efforts made for the accessibility of the voting centers and the accommodation of elderly and disabled voters, as well as the diversity of gender and age of the tens of thousands of citizen poll workers that carried out the day's work in over 10,000 voting tables in over 1,500 community voting centers.

Of course, the day was not without its irregularities. In the Concha Viuda de Escalón voting center, where CISPES observers are stationed, at least 25 monitors claiming to represent the Salvadoran Democracy Party (PDS) were arrested for using false credentials. In that same center, observers documented illegal campaigning by the Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) party just outside the center's entrance. In the John F. Kennedy School in Ilopango, CISPES observers were witness to dozens of ARENA party guides dressed in campaign shirts for the current ARENA party mayor of Ilopango operating within the voting center in violation of electoral law; TSE officials soon intervened and ordered the guides out of the center.

Overall, however, poll workers at all level seemed aware of regulations and willing to comply with them; voters with expired or illegible identification were not permitted to vote, campaign materials hung near the voting center's entrances were removed, and observers have been allowed unlimited access to all aspects of the electoral process.

As the counting of ballots for the Central American Parliament, National Legislative Assembly and Municipal governments are underway, observers tell us that poll workers appear to understand the procedure despite last minute reforms to the process, though turnout appears lower than the 2014 Presidential Elections, with between 50-60% in the centers where CISPES observers are stationed, perhaps due to voter confusion or frustration over the recent changes. Our teams are reporting a generally calm and collaborative atmosphere as everyone settles down for what is likely to be a long night.