Posted on 11/25/2016 4:32:23 PM PST by SeekAndFind
The Wisconsin Elections Commission announced Friday that it would hold a statewide recount of the presidential vote. The move was in response to petitions from two candidates, the Green Party's Jill Stein and independent Rocky Roque De La Fuente.
Federal law requires that all recounts be finished 35 days after the election, which is Dec. 13. One or both of the candidates will be required to pay for the recount.
"We have assembled an internal team to direct the recount, we have been in close consultation with our county clerk partners, and have arranged for legal representation by the Wisconsin Department of Justice," said Wisconsin Elections Commission Director Mike Haas in a statement.
"We plan to hold a teleconference meeting for county clerks next week and anticipate the recount will begin late in the week after the Stein campaign has paid the recount fee, which we are still calculating."
Haas added that the process is very detail-oriented and he is concerned that some counties will be challenged to finish on time. In a recount, ballots must be examined to determine voter intent before being counted.
Stein has been leading the effort to force general election recounts in certain swing states. Her effort continues to gain steam and money.
On Wednesday she announced she would demand recounts in three states: Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan. President-elect Donald Trump narrowly won Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, and Michigan is still too close to call.
To cover the cost of the recounts, Stein launched a fundraising campaign, which has raised more than $5 million in less than three days.
Stein's fundraiser website explicitly says the campaign is not an effort to help Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, but to "ensure the integrity of our elections." Clinton has not commented on the efforts.
The deadline to file for a recount in Pennsylvania is Monday and Michigan's is Wednesday.
Before the announcement was made, Haas called a potential recount "uncharted territory," according to Laurel White with Wisconsin Public Radio. White reported:
"State law allows any candidate on the ballot to request a recount, but if the margin is more than 0.25 percent, the candidate must pay for its cost. "Haas said the recount would cost at least $500,000. "The commission is reviewing state law to determine when that money would be due.
" 'There's a little bit of ambiguity in the statutes,' Haas said. 'In one place, it states that the fee must be paid at the time the petition is filed; another statute indicates once the petition is filed, that's when our agency calculates an estimate.'
"Once a recount order is issued by the commission, clerks across the state have 13 days to complete it, Haas said."
Stein initially set a fundraising goal of $2.5 million. As donations started pouring in, that goal jumped to $4.5 million, as New York Magazine's Yashar Ali pointed out on Twitter.
By Friday, the goal had jumped again, to $7 million. The campaign says that will go to cover filing fees, attorney fees and other associated costs.
Donations are still rolling in, but as Stein's fundraising website states, money doesn't necessarily mean the recounts are assured: "We cannot guarantee a recount will happen in any of these states we are targeting. We can only pledge we will demand recounts in those states."
If the recounts don't happen, what will become of all that money? Stein's website says any "surplus will also go toward election integrity efforts and to promote voting system reform." It did not specify what those efforts would be.
As NPR's Camila Domonoske told the Newscast unit, "Some security and election experts have publicly called for paper ballots to be checked in Wisconsin, Florida and Michigan, to make sure that the computers that counted those ballots weren't hacked." But, she says, "There's no evidence that the electronic machines were hacked or the election was compromised."
I guess the liberals were busy filling in absentee ballots
They must have created enough to make this work
Or they wouldn’t be wasting the money to do so
Oh good grief, FR’s own pu$$y brigade will be coming out of the woodwork over this.
Oh Noes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Let em go ahead.
It will change nothing except cost harassed county clerks overtime and see liberals’ money going into state coffers.
All because they can’t come to terms with reality.
Trump will become President.
These criminals are too much.
Sadly, we’ll have to deal with the hand-wringers here on FR. Good grief they are insufferable!
Wisconsin:
TRUMP: 1,411,432 47.87%
Hillary: 1,383,926 46.94%
Johnson: 106,470 3.58%
Stein: 31,016 1.04%
Hillary has to find some 27,507 votes to turn the results.
or just money
They count it in one night on election night (a few hours). Why do they need two weeks to recount it? Get this over with already
If anyone wants a recount and ballot verification, how about North Carolina? Governor’s race in particular.
Rocky Roque De La Fuente...... What the hell is that..!!
Agreed, they know the results before putting this into action. Trump’s team isn’t’ taking this seriously; they should, rigging is going on and they have a plan to try and deny him the Presidency (Even if it doesn’t work they are working on it)
$4.5 million dollars from a bunch of Solar Panel freaks? That’s a lot of “green” for a poverty party, but then again, Jill Stein is a wacko psychologist or psychiatrist and head the “Red-Green Watermelon Party”.
I don’t want to hear any more of this leftist crap that Republicans have all the money, esp. since Soros has more than Midas, plus the RockieFellers, Fords, Pillsbury, and Cummins stashes.
“Green is the new Red” and don’t you forget it.
Excuse me while I go harvest the last 20 tomatoes, corn and Zucchini I have in my little garden. I’m the real “Red-Green” guy - red tomatoes, green zucchini, and yellow-white (integrated) corn for social justice eaters.
In the infamous words of the woman entwined with a computer in “The X-Files”, Stein and party, “Byte Me”.
Exactly, Trump can respond on Monday though
He has time
nothing gets done on a holiday weekend in government
Thank you for posting that graphic. I had that exact image in mind.
I’m sure we’ll be admonished that our doom is eminent. These are the same hand-wringers that made this place miserable during the election; just sure of Trump’s eminent demise in the general election.
I wish they would just freaking go away!
It’s not that the votes are there, but they are going to try to manufacture something. The election happen 2 or 3 weeks ago, they wait until Black Friday to announce this? I’m glad it’s Trump in there because I believe once they take this seriously he WILL fight against their shenanigans. If he doesn’t then the people will have to grab a weapon and stand a post
This is what I thought. How is she even able to do this?
I have asked that very same question many, many, many times...
I doubt their campaign raised that much money and here they’ve done it in 2 days. uh huh, sure
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