While one of the two “Democrat stronghold” counties in Florida has managed to complete its machine recount ahead of the 3 p.m. deadline, some images and footage provided by a local outlet from the other problem-plagued county don’t encourage confidence that its going to get the job done.
Broward County managed to complete its recounts of some 700,000 votes overnight with several hours to spare before the big deadline Thursday. NBC 6 reports:
After days of being in the national spotlight – and being criticized by everyone from candidates to protesters from both major political parties – Broward County completed their machine recount of votes for three offices in the 2018 election ahead of Thursday’s deadline.
Workers put the last ballots to be counted through machines at election headquarters in Lauderhill around 11:30 p.m. Wednesday night. Officials will spend the remaining time before the 3 p.m. deadline Thursday going through ballots that were mailed in or not able to be read by the machines.
Meanwhile, Broward County Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes finds herself the subject of two court hearings Thursday after a judge ruled that she had violated Florida law in her handling of the process.
While the notoriously problematic Broward County wrapped up the recount in time, CBS 12 provided reason to worry that the Democrat-heavy Palm Beach won’t be able to say the same.
“Less than 12 hours until the #Florida #recount deadline…. no machines running here at Palm Beach County tabulation center. Where is everyone!?” reported CBS 12’s Kara Duffy.
“Hours away from the #Florida #election #recount. Here at the Palm Beach County tabulation center… silence,” she wrote. “Supervisor of Elections said: ‘We’re doing everything in our human power possible to make this happen.'”
“Hours away from the Florida #recount deadline… no workers in sight here at the Palm Beach County tabulation center? Where is everyone?” she reported later.
Duffy was likewise on the scene Wednesday providing updates as the recount re-started, then stopped.
“RIGHT NOW: observers being seated at tabulation table. Looks like they’re gearing up to start recounting process at Palm Beach County center,” she tweeted. “Recount, redo! SOE says Palm Beach County #voting machines overheated (which explains the little/no activity yesterday) forcing another recount of about 175K early votes.”
“[M]achines back up & running at #PalmBeachCounty tabulation center,” she posted later.
But at some point that evening, the whole place shut down, leaving Duffy asking “Where is everyone!?”
As if the situation in Florida wasn’t messy enough, a Barack Obama-appointed Florida judge has just extended the deadline to Saturday at 5 p.m. for voters whose votes weren’t tabulated due to signature problems.
As The Daily Wire reported earlier this week, historical precedent indicates that both Republicans in the two big races will come out of the recounts seeing their victories confirmed:
Heading into the recounts, Republicans Ron DeSantis and Rick Scott lead the two big Florida races for governor and U.S. Senate by counts of 33,669 and 12,536, respectively. So what are the chances that the recount will reverse the outcomes? According to the 26 elections that have experienced a recount in recent history, almost zero. In fact, the average number of total votes that actually changed from recounts of similar elections was just 311 votes. …
Citing the nonpartisan group FairVote, the [Miami Herald] notes that between 2000 and 2016, out of the 4,687 statewide elections only 26 went to a recount — and the outcomes of only three of those 26 reversed. “The 2004 Washington governor’s race, the 2006 Vermont state auditor’s race and the 2008 Minnesota U.S. Senate race. The average swing in those three elections after the recounts? About 311 votes.”