Former
Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein filed a petition Friday for a
recount of election results in Wisconsin.
An
election recount will take place soon in Wisconsin, after former Green Party
presidential candidate Jill Stein filed a petition Friday with the state’s
Election Commission, the first of three states where she has promised to
contest the election result.
The move from Stein, who raised millions since her Wednesday announcement that she would seek recounts of Donald Trump’s apparent election victories in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan, came just 90 minutes before Wisconsin’s 5 p.m. Friday deadline to file a petition. Now it will keep some hope alive for many Hillary Clinton supporters for another few weeks while Wisconsin recounts ballots before a Dec. 13 deadline.
Trump
scored upset victories in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, and seems on the path to
declare a victory in Michigan as well, though the result of the election in
that state will not be certified officially until Monday. Had Clinton won those
three states, previously seen as part of the Democrats’ “firewall,” she would
have secured enough electoral votes to win the election.
Stein
announced her intention to file the petition following reports that a group of
data experts and election lawyers were urging Clinton to demand a recount in
those three states, on suspicion that a cyber-attack could have manipulated the
results of the election in those states. While the group had no specific proof
of hacking, they
noted anomalies suggesting Clinton routinely did more poorly in Wisconsin
counties that used voting machines, as opposed to those that relied on paper
ballots.
Trump
secured a total of 1,404,000 votes in Wisconsin, according to the
commission; Clinton had 1,381,823.
In the
end, Stein, who secured 31,006 votes in Wisconsin, was not the only
presidential candidate to demand a recount. Rocky Roque De La Fuente, the
Reform Party nominee who got 1,514 Wisconsin votes, also filed a recount
petition, according to the state’s Election Commission.
Wisconsin
has the first deadline of the three states in question. If Stein’s campaign
wishes to file recount petitions in the other states as promised, she must do so
by Monday to meet Pennsylvania’s deadline, and Wednesday to meet the Nov. 30
deadline in Michigan.
In a statement, Wisconsin
Elections Commission Administrator Michael Haas guessed that the cost and complexity
of the recount would be in excess of the state’s last recount in 2011, which
carried a price tag of more than $520,000. In that recount over a state Supreme
Court seat, the commission had to recount 1.5 million votes — about half the
2.975 million ballot votes that were cast during the 2016 presidential
election.
Source: The Washington post...
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