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Florida orders first ever statewide hand-recounts as legal fights continue
www.tampabay.com ^ | 11/15/2018 | By David Smiley

Posted on 11/15/2018 2:55:02 PM PST by Red Badger

Following a five-day machine recount of the more than 8.3 million votes cast in the Nov. 6 elections, Secretary of State Ken Detzner ordered hand recounts Thursday afternoon.

An unprecedented statewide hand recount is now under way in the Sunshine State, further extending a high-stakes, partisan battle over every last vote in Florida's crucial U.S. Senate race.

Following a five-day machine recount of the more than 8.3 million votes cast in the Nov. 6 elections, Secretary of State Ken Detzner ordered hand recounts Thursday afternoon in the race between U.S. Sen Bill Nelson and Gov. Rick Scott, and also the race for agriculture commissioner between Nicole "Nikki" Fried and Matt Caldwell.

The order gives canvassing boards in the state's 67 counties three days to pore over thousands of ballots that were rejected by machines because of "overvotes" — a voter appears to have chosen more than one candidate in a race — or "undervotes," in which a voter appears to have skipped a race altogether. With the help of state guidelines, the canvassing boards, which are allowed to enlist the help of volunteers, will try to determine how these voters intended to vote.

It's not entirely clear how many such overvotes and undervotes exist in the U. S. Senate race. A Times/Herald analysis of state and county data shows the number could be between 35,000 and 118,000 But the determination on how those ballots were cast — and the ability of the state's elections supervisors to get through all the ballots — could go a long way toward deciding whether Nelson is reelected or Scott ascends from governor to U.S. Senator.

Thursday's order has been expected for at least a week. Elections supervisors around the state began bracing for automatic recounts in the hours after the polls closed on the midterm elections, as late-breaking returns out of heavily Democratic Broward and Palm Beach counties slimmed leads by Scott, Caldwell and GOP gubernatorial nominee Ron DeSantis.

Florida law requires a machine recount for any race decided by one half of one percentage point or less, and all three races were within the margins when elections supervisors submitted their unofficial results Saturday to the state. As required by law, Detzner quickly gave the state's canvassing boards five days to run their voting totals again in the three races to confirm whether any fell within one quarter of one percentage point, the margin by which Florida law requires a hand recount.

DeSantis' lead held Thursday as the counties reported their tallies, keeping him above the quarter-point threshold and making him Florida's governor-elect barring a legal challenge from Andrew Gillum. But, as expected, the margins in the U.S. Senate and agriculture commissioner races remained under the threshold, requiring hand recounts of overvotes and undervotes.

Now, the canvassing boards and teams of at least two volunteers — with at least one Republican and one Democrat on each team — will pore over thousands of ballots and report back to Detzner. State law requires that the state's canvassing boards conclude that process by Sunday, so that Florida's elections canvassing commission can certify the results of the election by Tuesday.


TOPICS: Breaking News; Crime/Corruption; Government; Politics/Elections; US: Florida
KEYWORDS: braking; duplicate
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To: MulberryDraw

Nothing. I do it a lot, especially if the race doesn’t matter to me, like Animal Control Officer (Dog Catcher), or the ‘retention’ of judges I don’t know.

What they are doing is looking at the ‘UNDER Votes’ and saying, “Look, they skipped the Senate race, but they voted for all Democrats in other races, so they must have just made a mistake, so we will assign this ‘vote’ to Nelson.”

OR

“Look, they voted TWICE in the Senate race, voting for BOTH candidates, but they voted for Dems in other races so we assign THIS VOTE to Nelson.”

It’s theft by acclamation.......................


81 posted on 11/16/2018 6:13:02 AM PST by Red Badger (We are headed for a Civil War. It won't be nice like the last one....................)
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To: ridesthemiles

“The Broward County ballot was formatted in a manner that would easily make a voter think they had voted on the entire ballot.”

...that would easily make a STUPID, UNINFORMED voter think they had voted...

I think I get her thinking here. Hiding it in an obscure area would make it easy for people not to vote that race. That leaves a blank slate for her posse to fill in bubbles later on — which they did.


82 posted on 11/16/2018 6:16:44 AM PST by MayflowerMadam (Great things never come from comfort zones.)
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To: libertylover

ALL......................


83 posted on 11/16/2018 6:18:29 AM PST by Red Badger (We are headed for a Civil War. It won't be nice like the last one....................)
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To: spacejunkie2001

“I read he was a recent democrap.”

He converted from Rat to GOP in 1984. From Wikipedia:
“Detzner graduated from Florida State University in 1975.[1] He was a registered Democrat until 1984 when he changed his registration to Republican.”


84 posted on 11/16/2018 6:27:50 AM PST by MayflowerMadam (Great things never come from comfort zones.)
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To: Waypoint

“They are now calling people who didn’t vote for Senator”

In America, ballots are secret. How do they know who to call? Sure, Absentee ballot ENVELOPES have the voter’s name, etc., but by the time these criminals touch the ballots, the envelope should have been separated from the ballot long before.


85 posted on 11/16/2018 6:29:54 AM PST by MayflowerMadam (Great things never come from comfort zones.)
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To: MayflowerMadam

the stupid, uninformed and ... dem machine voters.... who do not think but do as they are told, or “suggested” like the elderly in asstd living and nursing homes who get “volunteers” from the dem party to “assist” them in completing their ballots... as absentees from the precinct they cannot afford to go to, or be taken to.

This happened to our family members and we ‘caught’ the facility doing this for their dem machine pol pals. Raised holy hell with the State Elections people— calling out the volunteers, taking their photo and submitting them to the State. Put a stop to that right away. Guess they’d call that “voter suppression”.... no, there were alternatives the facility could have done... like take the ambulatory to the poll sites.

This entire 2018 election needs to be gone over with a fine tooth comb.... IMPOUND all the ballots of each precinct— DO NOT ALLOW ANY SOE to destroy 2018 ballots... describe them as “evidence”. Work out what they were doing and change the State law to PREVENT it ever occurring again.

Like— not meeting submission deadlines— or “finding ballots later”.

And.... RF sensors (encrypted to each absentee voter particularly as well as all in person ballots submitted to be scanned, encrypted as well vs. the voter’s name/ID, so their secret ballot remains secret... BUT accredited to the INDIVIDUAL VOTER— not something divined by a partisan canvassing board for the “intent” of an unknown person. EVERY Ballot— trackable by RF Sensor. Then, should some apparat take an entire box around in a rental car, would have real-time data... where they went, and IF they were ever submitted withing the time deadlines.


86 posted on 11/16/2018 7:09:17 AM PST by John S Mosby (Sic Semper Tyrannis)
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To: TexasGator

great! then perhaps we should let him administer it as well, and not hassle people who happen to do a double post :)


87 posted on 11/16/2018 7:22:41 AM PST by ConservativeDude
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To: Red Badger

The admin deleted mine


88 posted on 11/16/2018 7:42:33 AM PST by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: Mariner

There must have been a reason..................


89 posted on 11/16/2018 7:44:11 AM PST by Red Badger (We are headed for a Civil War. It won't be nice like the last one....................)
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To: John S Mosby

...”like the elderly in asstd living and nursing homes who get “volunteers” from the dem party to “assist” them in completing their ballots.”

When I was in charge of elections in my city, the volunteers who took Absentee Ballots to the shut-ins were League Of Women Voters. Turns out they’re raging leftists, but I wasn’t aware of that at the time - 35 years ago. (Can’t believe it’s been that long. I’m OLD!)


90 posted on 11/16/2018 7:52:34 AM PST by MayflowerMadam (Great things never come from comfort zones.)
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To: MayflowerMadam

Apparently not now— now they are side hired existing facility employees (who are also registered democrats and possibly illegal alien employees working as election manipulators under cash basis from demo party).

You are seasoned, from a time when the League of Women Voters was a sedate group of MORAL standard bearers for fairness and accuracy in our Debates, and in our Elections. Now they seem to be hitlery-bots, and Junior League fraudsters in real estate sales.


91 posted on 11/16/2018 8:03:54 AM PST by John S Mosby (Sic Semper Tyrannis)
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To: Red Badger

You posted in breaking news and gathered dozens of responses before the admin got a look.

So he deleted mine.


92 posted on 11/16/2018 8:16:27 AM PST by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: Mariner

I’ve had posts deleted in Breaking News before.................


93 posted on 11/16/2018 8:18:19 AM PST by Red Badger (We are headed for a Civil War. It won't be nice like the last one....................)
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Comment #94 Removed by Moderator

To: Red Badger

the admin was faced with the challenge of deleting a dupe post in breaking news with dozens of replies, or the first post with almost a dozen responses.

I support the choice he made.


95 posted on 11/16/2018 9:00:22 AM PST by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: Mariner

He flipped a coin................B^)


96 posted on 11/16/2018 9:02:28 AM PST by Red Badger (We are headed for a Civil War. It won't be nice like the last one....................)
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