Whoops! Rejected ballots discovered to be mixed in with valid ballots in Broward County

by | Nov 10, 2018


With unofficial vote totals from Tuesday’s election due to be handed into the state by noon Saturday, there was a new development in Florida’s post-election ballot counting. It was discovered Friday that more than a dozen rejected ballots had accidentally been mixed into nearly 200 valid ballots at the Broward County Supervisor of Elections office.

The error further undermines the level of competency within the Broward elections office which has been in the spotlight for the a number of ballots it has discovered and counted in the days following the election. The added votes have signicantly changed the vote margins in three statewide races — U.S. Senate, governor and agriculture commissioner — altering the percentages so much that it will likely trigger automatic recounts in all three contests.

The error was first reported Saturday by the Miami Herald.

The mistake — for which no one had a solution Friday night — was discovered after (Brenda) Snipes agreed to present 205 provisional ballots to the Broward County canvassing board for inspection. She hae initially intended to handle the ballots administratively, but agreed to present them to the canvassing board after Republican attorneys objected.

 

“We have found no clear authority controlling the situation faced by the board,” said Broward County Attorney Andrew Meyers.

At least 20 rejected ballots were erroneously placed in a stack of anonymous, valid ballots. The fact that they are anonymous means the rejected ballots can not be identified.

It’s the latest incident involving the canvassing of votes from the midterm election that has raised questions about the canvassing process for the election.

Florida’s local election officials have until noon on Saturday to submit their unofficial election results to state Division of Elections in Tallahassee.

Attorneys for U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson who has led the efforts to trigger recounts in the three statewide races lost a legal battle Friday to move back the Saturday deadline. U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle effectively denied Nelson’s request.

“This is how desperate Bill Nelson has become- he is attempting to commit voter fraud right out in public by asking judges to disregard legal deadlines and even count ballots which have already been considered and declared not legally cast,” said Chris Hartline, a spokesman for Gov. Rick Scott’s campaign. “… Bill Nelson and every single Floridian can know – we will not sit back and let anyone try to overrule the voters of Florida.”

Under state law, a machine recount is triggered if the margin of victory in a race is less than 0.5 percent, while a hand recount is triggered if the margin is less than 0.25 percent.

In the U.S. Senate race, Scott holds a 0.18 percent lead over Nelson. In the governor’s contest, Republican Ron DeSantis holds a lead of .44 percent over Democrat Andrew Gillum. Democrat Nikki Fried has a 0.04 percent over Republican Matt Caldwell.

 

10 Comments

  1. Sharon

    Pathetic corruption!

  2. BRENDA

    YOU WRITE ABOUT 10 VOTE THAT WERE REJECTED…FROM 1 MILLION Pathetic IN THE BIGGEST COUNTY SHAME ON YOU CHECK OTHER COUNTIES ,NORMAL IDIOTS

    • DeMann

      You are Dumb … 12 votes in 200 … that’s 5%+. You are why our kids are stupid.

    • Pam

      I read 20 ballots. The headline said 12. So its upwards of 10%, and we can guess about 20%. Definitely not doing her job with 700,000 ballots. Ouch!

  3. Monica

    Democrats will do just about anything to get elected and this proves it.

    • Anonymous

      Florida people are right this time Democrats are desperate to win this election this year and they do anything to do it, but one thing is in way, Republicans voters are not going to let this happen, no more lies crooked people like them Democrats

  4. Jeannine

    Fingerprints the ballots and make sure the owners fingerprints are on them.

  5. Anonymous

    That’s enough for prison time !!

  6. Tom

    Which crime analysts will perform the fingerprinting with whose taxes paid dollars? FDLE, not. There does need to be a”fingerprint” of sorts tied to each and every ballot cast in an election though. But not one of personal identification but of validity. There should never be published ballots that are left blank, like extras, the ones that could have been cast, but not enough people showed up to fill them out. Like leaving blank checks laying around to bring temptation.

    • Pam

      It’s time to print them when we check in to vote after showing IDENTIFICATION and being scanned. Can easily add to our Drivers License as theyve done for organ donor!

 

What is the most glaring political issue facing Floridians ahead of Legislative Session?
×
%d bloggers like this: