Palm Beach County completed its recount Thursday only to discover that it was missing a “substantial” number of votes when compared to the initial count, according to a New York Times reporter.
Florida is currently conducting a recount for the gubernatorial race between Republican Ron DeSantis and Democrat Andrew Gillum, and the Senate race between Republican Rick Scott and Democrat incumbent Bill Nelson.
Frances Robles of The NYT reported that Palm Beach County’s recount was missing votes and it was trying to figure out from which precincts the votes were missing.
Palm Beach county recount is missing votes. They’re trying to figure out why.
— Frances Robles (@FrancesRobles) November 15, 2018
The votes did not disappear — Palm Beach has all of the ballot boxes on site — but election officials have to determine which votes were not counted in the machine recount.
The recount has a significantly lower number of votes than the original, So they’re having to look at the log and figure out which precincts are missing. The boxes are here — they need to be identified and resubmitted in the machine.
— Frances Robles (@FrancesRobles) November 15, 2018
Palm Beach Elections Supervisor Susan Bucher said she takes “full responsibility” for the error and revealed that her county was unlikely to meet the 3 p.m. deadline for the recount. (RELATED: Media Dismisses Florida Election Misconduct As Conservative Conspiracy)
Several days ago, Palm Beach was required to restart its recount after voting machines overheated.
Last week, Scott filed suit against Palm Beach County for refusing to allow ballots to be submitted to the canvassing board for review and for barring Republican Party officials from being present during ballot counting. A judge ruled in Scott’s favor and ordered Bucher to submit ballots to the canvassing board.