Fraud claims as Florida faces midterm recounts

RECOUNTS of two key US midterm elections began in Florida yesterday amid accusations of fraud by both sides in the race for governor and a Senate seat.

Exhausted election office employees were told they had until Thursday to tally up votes cast in last Tuesday’s election.

Unofficial results from Saturday showed Republican Rick Scott’s lead in the Senate race had narrowed to 12,600 ahead of Bill Nelson, the Democrat incumbent.

Meanwhile, Andrew Gillum, a Democrat vying to become Florida’s first black governor, retracted an earlier concession after the count narrowed to put him within 33,600 votes of Ron Desantis, the Republican candidate.

Both counts were hit by the slow postal vote counts that put the candidates within a margin of error that triggered a machine recount.

Accusations of fraud and threats of lawsuits from both sides conjured up memories of the state’s controversial recount during the 2000 presidential election.

The recount ran into early problems in Broward County on Sunday, when a voting machine failed to register all ballots and Republicans asked for all machines to be tested. The count got under way after a two-hour delay. The heavily Democratic county is one of two where the Republicans have made allegations concerning possible ballot irregularities.