Iowa Democratic Party officials planned to use a mobile app to collect the results of more than 1600 caucuses that took place across the state on Monday night. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video In previous caucuses, the party used a phone system to have local volunteers call the results into state headquarters. But this time, state officials instructed the local volunteers, known as precinct chairs, to download a mobile app. It was designed to collect the data and then provide results. Before voting even began, complaints about the app surfaced in media. Users complained in interviews that it was difficult to log into the app.

IDP Chairman Troy Price said on Tuesday that the app also had a "coding problem" that caused more issues, but said there was no hack or intrusion involved. Precinct captain Carl Voss, of Des Moines, Iowa, holds his iPhone that shows the Iowa Democratic Party's caucus reporting app in Des Moines, Iowa. Credit:AP Busy phone lines By 10pm local time, it became clear that Iowa Democrats were going to have to find another way to tabulate the results. Local party officials began calling to submit their results, but jammed phone lines meant that even the old-fashioned way wasn't working.

"We had people with their phones on speaker who were stuck on hold from 9 through at least 11," said Linn County Democratic Party Chairman Bret Nilles. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video Too many numbers Further exacerbating the problem was the volume of information that Democratic officials had to collect this time. Each individual caucus involves a two-step process. Voters pick a candidate. And then any voter who backs a candidate with less than 15 per cent support makes a second choice. Then the results are converted into delegates.

In previous years, only the number of delegates had to be tabulated. This year, all three parts - the first vote, the second and the number of delegates - must be reported. When we will know the winner? The silver lining, Democrats in Iowa say, is that all of the results have a paper trail. Precinct captain Carl Voss, of Des Moines, Iowa, holds his iPhone that shows the Iowa Democratic Party's caucus reporting app in Des Moines, Iowa. Credit:AP All voters who attended a caucus filled out a card indicating their picks - both the first and second.

"The good news is that they didn’t use (the mobile app) for voting, which means the results are available and have been preserved on paper," said voting security advocate Schneider. Troy Price, the party's state chairman, said more than 50 per cent of results from the Iowa caucuses would be released at 5pm Washington, DC-time (9am Wednesday in Sydney), 21 hours after voters gathered Monday night to choose a Democratic candidate in schools and community centers around the state. The delay enraged Iowa Democrats worried that the confusion would play into Trump's hands and prompted some Democratic candidates' campaigns to question whether the results would be legitimate. It was a clumsy start to 2020 voting, after a tumultuous presidential campaign four years ago that produced a surprise winner in Trump and led to a two-year federal investigation into election interference by Russia. "Every second that passes undermines the process a little bit," said Roger Lau, campaign manager for US Senator Elizabeth Warren.