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Florida Recount, Georgia Lawsuit, and Democratic Gains: Here's How Undecided Midterm Races Stand

By Daniel Politi, Slate

12 November 18

 

lmost a week since the midterm elections, several key contests remain up in the air and tensions are running high. On Saturday, President Donald Trump joined Republicans who are raising the specter of fraud, warning that Democrats are “trying to STEAL two big elections in Florida.” And it isn’t just Florida that Republicans are worried about (and have been quick to raise suspicions about). Calvin Moore, a regional communications director for the National Republican Senate Committee, sent a tweet suggesting that a county election official in Arizona was “destroying evidence to cook the books” in favor of Democrat Kyrsten Sinema.

Trying to STEAL two big elections in Florida! We are watching closely!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 10, 2018

WOW. The AZ election official destroying evidence to cook the books for @kyrstensinema defended narco-terrorists.

Now it’s all making sense why he’s stretching the rules for Kyrsten “I Don’t Care If Americans Join The Taliban” Sinema. #AZSENhttps://t.co/NZDcaDq3Yj

— Calvin Moore (@CalvinMoore_) November 10, 2018

All the fraud talk virtually assures that several key races will remain up in the air for a while, but here is where everything stands as the week begins.

Florida

It is a ripe time for flashbacks to the 2000 presidential election disaster, as all eyes are on Florida for the first full, statewide vote recount in its history, which began over the weekend. Gov. Rick Scott’s lead in the Senate race over Democratic incumbent Bill Nelson was 0.14 percentage points, or fewer than 13,000 votes. In the gubernatorial contest, Democratic candidate Andrew Gillum retracted his earlier concession to Ron DeSantis as unofficial results showed him behind by 0.41 percentage points. Under state law, a machine recount is necessary if the margin is less than 0.5 percentage points. Then a manual recount would be ordered if the margin is 0.25 percentage points or below.

For now, Florida’s 67 elections departments are rushing to finish the recount of more than 8.2 million combined ballots by Thursday. But some are already saying it’s looking unlikely. In Palm Beach County, for example, the supervisor of elections said she doesn’t believe they’ll be able to meet the deadline. There was also lots of focus on Broward County, where the recount was delayed for several hours and officials acknowledged they mistakenly counted 22 absentee ballots. All of this led to criticism from Republicans, and Gov. Rick Scott ended up filing suit against Broward’s supervisor of elections, Brenda Snipes. Broward County is particularly important for the Senate race because there are almost 25,000 ballots that recorded a vote for governor but not for Senate.

Arizona Senate Race

Things are getting so heated in Arizona that retiring Republican Sen. Jeff Flake felt the need to come out and contradict an official from his own party who had raised the possibility of fraud in the still-open contest to take over his seat. Republicans were getting increasingly nervous over the weekend as Democrat Kyrsten Sinema widened her lead over Martha McSally on Sunday to 32,292 votes, or 1.5 percentage points. Approximately 215,000 ballots still need to be counted statewide, according to Arizona Republic estimates. As tensions increased, Flake responded to Moore’s tweet warning of possible fraud by saying that “There is no evidence of election officials ‘cooking the books’ in Arizona.” Sinema’s campaign is calling the Democrat’s lead “insurmountable.” Analysts appear to largely agree Sinema seems set to come out on top.

There is no evidence of election officials "cooking the books" in Arizona. Such careless language undermines confidence in our democratic institutions. https://t.co/cNjYp0yIa1

— Jeff Flake (@JeffFlake) November 11, 2018

Georgia Gubernatorial Race

Democrats in Georgia seem determined to go down the legal route to push Brian Kemp’s vote count below 50 percent, which would force a runoff. For now, Kemp is ahead with a slim, but decisive, lead of almost 60,000 votes. Stacey Abrams’ campaign filed a lawsuit Sunday calling on a judge to delay the vote certification in Georgia by one day to make sure all votes that may have been wrongly rejected are counted. That would mean the vote wouldn’t be certified until Wednesday. Although Abrams’ supporters celebrated over the weekend as Kemp’s lead narrowed, “she still needs to net about 22,000 votes to force a Dec. 4 runoff, and there aren’t many votes that have yet to be reported,” notes the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Kemp’s campaign has called Abrams’ refusal to concede “a disgrace to democracy.”

California House Races

Tight congressional contests in California are turning out to be largely good news for Democrats who are at least giving a fight to incumbent Republicans. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher lost the House seat he held for three decades as Democrat Harley Rouda claimed victory on Saturday in the tight race for California’s 48th Congressional District. That left three California congressional races to be decided. In two of them, incumbent Republicans are locked in close battles—Reps. Jeff Denham in the 10th District and Mimi Walters in the 45th District. Democratic candidate Josh Harder currently has a slim lead over Denham while Walters still has a tiny lead over Democrat Katie Porter. In the 39th District, Republican Young Kim has a narrow lead to take over for retiring Rep. Ed Royce, who is also a Republican.

Other Congressional Races

There are still several House races that are up in the air. In Georgia’s 7th Congressional District, Republican Rep. Rob Woodall is leading Democrat Carolyn Bourdeaux. In New Jersey’s 3rd District, Democrat Andrew Kim is leading Republican Rep. Tom MacArthur. In New York, Democrat Anthony Brindisi has a slim margin ahead of Rep. Claudia Tenney in the 22nd District. In New York’s 27th District, GOP Rep. Chris Collins is leading. In Utah’s 4th District Democrat Ben McAdams is leading Republican Rep. Mia Love. In Texas’ 23rd District, GOP Rep. Will Hurd is leading. In Maine’s 2nd District, Republican Rep. Bruce Poliquin is ahead of Democrat Jared Golden.