A federal judge will decide today if Allegheny County will be permitted to use new electronic voting machines it purchased earlier this month for the May primary or if it must go back to the old lever machines.

U.S. District Judge Gary L. Lancaster spent the past three days hearing testimony and arguments at a preliminary injunction hearing in a lawsuit filed by a group of Allegheny County residents and People for the American Way.

The lawsuit claims that there is not enough time to properly train poll workers and voters on the new machines and that they are not fully accessible to voters with certain disabilities.

Allegheny County officials have claimed, though, that there is no way they would be able to have the lever machines ready for the primary, and even if they could, the county might have to return some of a $12 million grant from the federal government received as part of the Help Americans Vote Act.

The judge will rule at 10 a.m. today.