Florida has a history of sketchy election recounts

I’ve been watching some of the general outrage on CNN this weekend over the idea that Republicans would dare to question the integrity of the ongoing vote counting in Florida. Of course, it all seems to be rather selective outrage, mixed with a curious lack of interest in recent history when it comes to the Sunshine State and counting votes in close races. Florida officials aren’t doing themselves any favors in this situation, particularly when they appear to be going out of their way to make it look like they’re hiding something. Take this report from a local NBC News outlet when they were informed that the press wouldn’t be allowed to film any of the ballot counting being done by Susan Bucher, the Supervisor of Elections in Palm Beach County.

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Palm Beach County is far from the worst of the fog surrounding the midterm vote counting. And some of the players taking part are actually familiar names from similar controversies in the past. The Daily Caller provides more examples, along with a list of a dozen times Florida officials have been found engaging in either very sketchy, if not plainly illegal practices.

The state’s Republican Gov. Rick Scott filed a lawsuit Thursday against Broward election supervisor Brenda Snipes for allegedly refusing to tell them about votes she has not yet counted.

The vote totals Snipes tabulated two days after the election would have readers believe that more people cast votes for agricultural commissioner than for U.S. Senator.

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Ms. Snipes’ (of Broward County) name comes up quite often in these discussions. The Daily Caller goes on to point out that the vote totals in Broward and Palm Beach look more than odd. We’re expected to believe that three times as many voters in those counties decided to randomly leave their vote for Senator blank while filling in a vote for governor. Also, more people were fired up to vote for the Agricultural Commissioner than their next Senator?

You might also notice that Marc Elias has been hired to litigate a recount on behalf of Democrats. I wrote about Elias back in 2015, when we learned that one of his claims to fame was representing a voter registration group in Ohio that had a peculiar habit of registering dead people.

The RNC list I mentioned above is also worth a look. A few of the lowlights from Florida’s vote counting history include cases where Snipes was found to have illegally destroyed ballots which a court had ordered preserved. She was also found to have been opening ballots in private (much like Ms. Bucher, mentioned at the top of this article, and in clear violation of state law), as well as mysteriously losing crates of absentee ballots from certain precincts.

Despite that track record, Snipes not only still has her job but is hip deep in the vote counting again this year. But it’s apparently outrageous for anyone to point out these facts. How dare we question the integrity of these fine Florida elected officials?

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David Strom 10:30 AM | October 04, 2024
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Ed Morrissey 10:40 PM | October 03, 2024
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