Free Republic

On September 2, 1948, Lyndon Baines Johnson ran in the Democrat primary for the U.S. Senate against Democrat Texas Governor Coke Stevenson. Governor Coke Stevenson was more popular and would have won, but there were notorious ballot irregularities to steal the election. Mysteriously, a box of uncounted ballots was “discovered” in the south Texas town of Alice in Jim Wells County, Precinct 13. Confusion reigned in Texas and by the end of the week, LBJ won by 87 votes. Both sides accused the other of voter fraud. The FBI, Postal Department and other agencies were investigated. Piecing together the details,...

Election officials in Ohio found 588 uncounted votes Wednesday in a suburb of Columbus, county officials said. After counting the ballots, Republican Troy Balderson received 198 votes; Democrat Danny O’Connor got 388 votes; and Joe Manchik, 2 votes. Thus, O’Connor gained 190 on Balderson, who currently leads by 1,564 votes in the close race. “The votes from a portion of one voting location had not been processed into the tabulation system,” officials explained. “Election night results are tabulated through the use of a device called a master PEB that is returned to the Board along with flash drives from each...

Several boxes full of ballots for this week’s Italian general election were found in Rome today, officials said, after Premier Silvio Berlusconi rejected the centre-left’s victory claim and demanded a recount. The boxes, at least five, carried the symbol of the Interior Ministry. They included electoral material and were found by someone in a rubbish bin, said Vincenzo Giulivo, head of the polling station. The ANSA news agency said the ballots had been filled out. The election on Sunday and Monday was one of the closest in Italian history. Romano Prodi’s centre-left opposition has won control of both houses of...

The discovery of uncounted ballots in a King County elections facility could change the tenor of the governor's-election lawsuit, and it comes just as Republicans fine-tune their case in the final weeks before trial and drop some previously high-profile claims. Already, attorneys for both sides say the news of 94 uncounted, valid absentee ballots means scrambling to change plans for last-minute collection of evidence. They will expand the list of officials they want to question under oath and will change the nature of questions they'll ask King County's top two election officials, who were already scheduled for depositions. News of...