LAS VEGAS (AP) — Hundreds of people waited for hours Tuesday at three in-person voting sites in the Las Vegas area, and the only one in Reno, after polling places were reduced due to the coronavirus.

People who did not mail in their choices were casting ballots in a primary to settle U.S. House races, legislative primaries and other state and local races. State election officials promised that everyone in line when polls closed at 7 p.m. would be allowed to vote, and predicted long delays counting ballots as a result.

A Democratic Party leader accused the Republican secretary of state of creating long lines by limiting the number of in-person polling places.

Washoe County elections chief Deanna Spikula acknowledged waits of almost three hours and the Associated Press spoke with multiple people at a Clark County site who said they waited more than four hours. One man at Clark County Elections Headquarters said he waited five hours. The Las Vegas Review-Journal estimated about 300 people were still in line at the one other Clark County site after 9 p.m.

“When I first got here, they said it was going to be an hour. I was like, ‘OK,’” Charles Wallace said after waiting from 11:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at the county facility in North Las Vegas. “And once I got in, there was like a long, long, long line.”

Across town, “This is the end of the line,” read the handmade sign that security guard Deondre Morgan held as he began turning away would-be voters who wanted to join a loose line snaking through a park outside a community center several miles east of the Las Vegas Strip. Steve Connolly was the last to make it. An official told him at about 9:15 p.m. the wait could be another 2 1/2 hours.

About half the people in line, including Connolly, wore face coverings as a precaution against the coronavirus pandemic that prompted election officials to encourage people to cast ballots by mail.

About the same time, at the front of the line, college students Claire Carpenter and Mya Mitchell entered the community center with 10 stations at which they would have ballots printed for them to vote. Their wait had been almost five hours, but they credited election officials with offering water and snacks to those waiting with them.

They said no one spoke against allowing older people and those with disabilities to be ushered to the front of the line.

“Our mail went to our schools,” said Mitchell, a student at the University of Nevada, Reno. “I haven’t been there to get my mail since March.”

Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske’s plan to convert the primary to mostly mail-based balloting — an effort to limit crowds that can spread the coronavirus — called for at least one polling place in each of the state’s 17 counties.

Clark County, the state’s most populous, added two more in-person sites after the state Democratic Party sued to challenge the plan. Party Chairman William McCurdy II said in a statement Tuesday night that the hours-long wait times were the reason the party sued.

“Had the secretary of state gotten her way and Clark County voters were limited to just a single polling location, these wait times would have been even longer,” McCurdy said. “We will continue fighting ... to prevent a repeat in November should we find ourselves under the same circumstances.”

In Washoe County, hundreds of people were in line at 7 p.m., and Spikula projected more than 1,400 in-person ballots would be cast at the site on Tuesday. In most elections, with multiple polling places open, no more than 600 ballots come in per precinct, she said.

Spikula said county staff had to clear the polling place several times to accommodate voters who refused to wear masks or have their temperatures taken as a screening for fever, a symptom of COVID-19. She called the time-intensive procedure necessary to allow everyone to vote, including those unable to wear masks for health reasons.

“We had to process everyone that was already inside, let them finish voting and get outside. We then allowed the person to go in and vote and only once they left could we resume processing the rest of the voters in line,” Spikula said.

Ed Cohen, a candidate in the Democratic primary for Congress, talked with people beyond a 100-foot boundary for campaigning and said most people he encountered were Republicans voting in person because they didn’t trust mailed ballots could be counted.

Lily Baran was last in line in Reno. She said she didn’t understand why Nevada officials limited the number of polling places but opened the state’s casinos.

“We can suddenly gamble and eat sushi. Then, I think we can also vote in more locations,” she said. “I can go and play blackjack at how many places? And how many places can I vote? That just seems a little weird.”

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Associated Press writer Michelle L. Price in Las Vegas contributed to this report. Metz reported from Carson City. He is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.