Candidates sue to stop count of provisional ballots (guess what party)

[spotbird]

You're right!

The Republican candidate for state school superintendent and two local candidates have sued to get a Superior Court judge to block recounts in their close election contests until there's a decision on how many ballots are counted.

*skip*

Fletcher last week requested a recount in his race against Democrat June Atkinson. The unofficial vote totals showed Fletcher lost his race by about 9,200 votes.

[BlueEyedSon]

1. LInketty-link please?

[ParanoidPat]

2. Must we guess which State and County too?

LOL! Can you drop us a hint? :shrug: :evilgrin:

On Edit: Never mind! I found it.

http://www.wdnweb.com/articles/2004/11/10/news/news01.txt

Tuesday, November 16, 2004

Special election totals gap narrows
By MIKE VOSS, Contributing Editor

The gap between Republican Stan Deatherage and Democrat Etles Henries in the race for to fill the unexpired term of former Beaufort County Commissioner Carol Cochran narrowed to 18 votes Tuesday after the Beaufort County Board of Elections reviewed provisional ballots and approved vote totals in a marathon session.

As a result of the provisional ballots approved by the board and the canvass of the ballots from the Nov. 2 election, most candidates in other races picked up additional votes. Those votes did not affect the outcome of local races.

Deatherage, a former commissioner, tallied 9,002 votes to Henries' 8,984. Libertarian candidate Joel Turner picked up five votes Tuesday, finishing with 1,331.

Henries has called for a recount. Elections Director Kellie Hopkins said she's waiting to hear if a recount will be conducted for any statewide race before scheduling the local recount. If there is a statewide recount, she wants to conduct it with the local recount.

There's a possibility at least one statewide race -- the contest for superintendent of public instruction between Democrat June Atkinson and Republican Bill Fletcher -- will have a recount. Candidates in statewide races have until noon Thursday to request a recount.

The local recount could come as early as Friday. The winner of the race will serve the remaining two years of Cochran's term. Cochran resigned in August, citing marriage and a move to New Mexico as her reasons for giving up her seat.

Hopkins warned the recount could result in the candidates losing votes because some ballots with write-in votes on them might have been counted twice. The county's voting machines count and record votes on ballots that have write-in votes on them. The voting machines deposit those ballots in a special bin, from which the ballots are removed so the write-in votes can be counted. Hopkins explained that some precincts also may have hand-counted other races on ballots with write-in votes, resulting in those ballots being counted a second time.

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