Posted on 11/10/2006 1:08:13 PM PST by madison10
Eight House races remain without winners after Tuesday's election, with Republican incumbents in tight contests to keep their seats and state officials not rushing to end the dispute.
Rep. Deborah Pryce, a member of the House Republican leadership, is ahead in her central Ohio race by 3,536 votes. In the Columbus, Ohio- area, elections officials are delaying the count of more than 9,000 provisional ballots by one day so it doesn't disrupt the much-vaulted Ohio State-Michigan football game on Nov. 18.
Elections officials in that district will start counting Nov. 19.
Ohio Republican Rep. Jean Schmidt, who called Democratic Rep. John Murtha a coward, is ahead of her challenger by 2,862 votes. Rep. Barbara Cubin, who threatened to slap her wheelchair-bound Libertarian opponent after a debate, is ahead by fewer than a thousand votes in her Wyoming contest.
Of the eight uncalled races, only one _ Joe Courtney's challenge to Republican Rep. Rob Simmons in Connecticut _ gives a Democratic challenger the lead. In that race, Courtney is ahead by a scant 166 votes. Almost a quarter of a million votes were cast.
A Thursday recount in Hebron, Conn., gave Simmons one more vote. Recounts were scheduled in 74 other towns through the weekend.
In Florida, a recount is set to begin Wednesday in Rep. Katherine Harris' former district. Republican Vern Buchanan has a 373-vote lead and has declared victory over Democrat Christine Jennings. The Associated Press has declared Buchanan the winner.
In Georgia, first-term Democratic Rep. John Barrow, facing a rematch against former Republican Rep. Max Burns, leads by fewer than 600 votes.
In Washington state, the count in a suburban Seattle district was delayed by heavy flooding, leaving incumbent Republican Rep. Dave Reichert ahead of challenger Darcy Burner three days after voting ended.
Other races that remain undecided include North Carolina Rep. Robin Hayes' campaign against Larry Kissell, separated by 449 votes; and New Mexico Rep. Heather Wilson's race, where Democrat Patricia Madrid trails by about 1,600 votes.
Gibbs received more votes in her special election then did Lampson in the General.
If everyone who voted for in the Special had written her in, she would have won the general as well.
I think a number of Republicans were upset that she did not get chosen through the Primary process and thus, withheld their vote from her.
In 08 that seat will go back Republican.
We had leadership when Bush Sr. was in office?
Who?
The Senate Republican leadership back then was Dole, was it not?
The ultimate compromiser!
According to the latest numbers, JD is now down by 5,526 votes.
Does anyone know about the Chavez-related computers the US received for this election? Something is fishy here. The Democrat cabal pulled it off with the new machines. Voter fraud on computers is not new. A book by that name was written by the Collier brothers in Florida. Strangely, they both died not long after the book was printed.
I have never heard of this. Maybe someone else here knows about it.
Fox News just reported that Reicher has been declared the winner in WA-8 with +3500 votes! YIPEEEEEEEE!!!! He's my congresscritter.
Unfortunately, after the last fiasco election here, I'm waiting for them to find 3600 votes for Darcy Burner.
Reicher = Reichert
That's great. Things not looking so good for JD in Arizona. Of course, I do not know how far along they are in the counting. As of now, he is down by 5,817 votes.
every seat counts.
The SOS website has him up by about 5500 (updated about 20 minutes ago). Looks solid! Way to go!
BREAKING: Reichert (R-WA) has won.
Oh gosh. JD is one of my favorite congressmen. I thought he'd win for sure and couldn't believe it when the race got so close. I'm really pulling for him - I sure hope it turns around and he wins!
I hope so too. I don't care for Mitchell. He was a high school history teacher at Tempe High for several years and was mayor of Tempe as well.
I cannot believe JD is losing this. Maybe he will run for governor in four years.
That is sure the truth - especially now!
from JD's website:
November 10, 2006
Election Update: Arizona Congressional District 5
What's going on?
Here are some simple facts you may not know about the ballot counting process currently underway in Maricopa County.
This is not a recount.
The ballots outstanding, estimated to be about 258,000 on election night and now about 222,000 as of Thursday evening have not yet been counted.
The breakout of the uncounted ballots after Election Day were as follows:
217,000 early ballots
37,000 provisional ballots
1,300 conditional provisional ballots
Early ballots are being counted first, so the result of the 35,329 ballots that were added to the unofficial results on Thursday evening can be subtracted from the original uncounted early ballot total. There are now about 181,500 early ballots that still need to be counted.
How does this impact the Fifth Congressional District race?
On the Thursday prior to Election Day, we know that about 100,000 early ballots had been requested and more than 60,000 of them had been cast. We know that the request and return rates were heavily weighted to voters registered as Republicans.
Early ballots collected via mail at the Elections office on Friday, Saturday, Monday and Tuesday (Election Day) are not included in those numbers, but it is estimated to be about 12,000 additional ballots in our Congressional District.
Early ballots can also be walked into the polls. It is unknown how many of these were walked in. Based on anecdotal evidence we would estimate around 5,000 in our District.
There have been approximately 13,000 early ballots that are now included in the unofficial totals. That would leave a very conservative estimate of about 64,000 early ballots that remain to be counted in CD5.
Provisional Ballots
There are a number of ways provisional ballots are cast, the most common are:
An address that does not correspond between your valid Arizona identification and your voter registration information.
Requesting an early ballot, but voting at the polls. (Interesting note here: Congressman Hayworth's vote is included in this portion of the uncounted votes.)
Voting at a poll location other than your own.
County officials say that historically about 80% of provisional ballots are valid and ultimately added to the vote totals. Based on the interest and tenor of the CD5 race and the demographic makeup of the District, it would be a conservative estimate to say that about one-third of the provisionals were cast in CD5. That would give us more than 12,000, of which about 11,000 will likely be counted.
The Conditional Provisional ballots were cast by individuals who could not produce a valid Arizona ID or other proof of residency. It is unknown how many of these will apply to CD5 or how many of the people will show up at a voting center to prove their ID by the deadline of Wednesday Nov. 15 at 5 pm.
With all of that, here is what it all means.
We conservatively estimate that there are 75,000 votes still to be counted in CD5 with much of that heavily weighted toward registered Republicans, and the total that remains to be counted could be considerably higher.
So, we continue to advocate that each legally cast ballot must be legally counted.
On another note, our campaign and the Republican Party put on an amazing effort to get out the vote in CD5. We heartily congratulate our volunteers for the incredible amount of time and energy you donated to our campaign and the efforts to advance a strong, common sense agenda. Thank you.
I think we can then assume that some would have voted for Gibbs if they knew how to do a write in. That's the point, they are too uninformed to write in anyone.
Probably also many did not think it worth the extra effort.
Whatever the reason, Gibbs would have won had everyone who voted for in the Special did so in the General.
And I can think we can safely assume that those who voted for her in the special were not Lampson voters.
It was therefore a big mistake for her to have entered the special election then. Lampson knew better.
Not at all.
The special election gave her creditability as the Republican candidate
Lampson did not enter the special election because he knew he would lose straight up to any Republican.
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