Florida already had a machine recount for the much-wanted governor seat. Florida officials ordered a manual recount for the senate race between Rick Scott, the current Republican governor, and the Democratic incumbent, Bill Nelson.
Some Mishaps in the Recount
The midterm general elections just happened, repositioning the republicans and democrats throughout the United States. For most, voting is a thing of the past for now, for Florida, not so much. Florida has had multiple recounts in the past week but still managed to not get the results wanted. Broward County, the second largest county in Florida, was two minutes late in submitting their recount. A deadline was put in place, and they were late, so the recount of over 700,000 votes was not accepted. [1]
Palm Beach County could not finish the recount in time, and Hillsborough County had power failures which resulted in them not finishing the recount in time either.
All three of these counties had to revert to the numbers they had first posted on Saturday.
 Broward County, the scene of several years of vote-counting problems, was two minutes late in reporting its data and state officials refused to accept its tallies. Authorities in Hillsborough County said they could not submit recount totals because their new tally had 846 fewer votes than originally counted. The office had two power failures during the recount that may have led to the discrepancy, they said. [2]
The Driving Force Behind Everything
In the end, this recount is more about democrats versus republicans and less about anything else. Gillum lost the race for governor but refuses to give up counting. The margin between him and his opponent is large enough that Florida declared DeSantis the governor-elect.
The race for Senate and agriculture commissioner are still ongoing although it seems pretty hopeless for Senator Bill Nelson. With every passing day, Rick Scott gains more votes, and his victory is pretty evident.
Not everyone is happy with how the recount is going though. Some Republicans believe voter fraud is happening in Florida.
Trying to STEAL two big elections in Florida! We are watching closely!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 10, 2018
Some candidates refuse to give up even though they are somewhat far behind in the count.
The deadline has been extended so that we #CountEveryVote. If you had an issue with your Vote-By-Mail or Provisional Ballot, you have until Saturday at 5 p.m. to cure it. Go to https://t.co/14oW1pIh3z to get the right information for your Supervisor of Elections. pic.twitter.com/oYzrICbrai
— Andrew Gillum (@AndrewGillum) November 16, 2018
Notes:
- ^Ryan Nobles, C. (2018). Florida recount Day 7: State of Play. [online] CNN. Available at: https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/16/politics/florida-recount-day-7/index.html [Accessed 16 Nov. 2018]. (go back ↩)
- ^Nytimes.com. (2018). Recount Ordered in Florida Senate Race as Governor’s Contest Nears End. [online] Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/15/us/florida-recount.html [Accessed 16 Nov. 2018]. (go back ↩)
