Scott defeats Nelson in Florida Senate race after bitter recount fight

[mystery-ak]

Scott defeats Nelson in Florida Senate race after bitter recount fight
By Max Greenwood - 11/18/18 01:14 PM EST

Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) has defeated Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) in a nationally watched Senate race that triggered two recounts and a series of bitter legal and public relations battles.

The contest came to an end on Sunday as a noon deadline passed for county election officials to submit the results of a hand recount that showed Scott leading Nelson by about 10,000 votes or about 0.12 percentage.

The hand recount was ordered after a machine recount showed the two candidates separated by only about 12,600 votes, or 0.15 points.

The latest results cemented Scott’s victory in a hard-fought race that stretched nearly two weeks past Election Day, when he appeared to edge out Nelson by less than 1 point.

But as vote tallies continued to trickle in from heavily Democratic Broward and Palm Beach counties in the days that followed, Scott’s lead narrowed considerably, putting the race within the 0.5-point threshold required to trigger a recount.

That recount touched off a round of litigation from both campaigns and ignited a bitter fight in the court of public opinion, in which Republicans raised the prospect of rampant elections fraud and Democrats accused the GOP of voter suppression.

Democrats sought to use a series of federal lawsuits to challenge Florida voting laws in recent days. But those lawsuits saw only limited success in court, with a judge denying the vast majority of requests to throw out state election standards and requirements.

more
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/417294-scott-defeats-nelson-in-florida-senate-race-after-bitter-recount-fight

[mystery-ak]

CNN Politics
‏Verified account @CNNPolitics

JUST IN: Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson will be releasing a statement at 3 p.m. on the Florida Senate race

[mystery-ak]

Waiting for Nelson's concession speech
 

[Snarknado]

Good news, but it still worries me that they managed to erase 80+% of Scott's election day lead. They came far too close to stealing it, and that will encourage even more creative shenanigans next time around.

[mystery-ak]

Fox News Alert
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Democrat Bill Nelson concedes to Republican Rick Scott after bitter Florida race

[Frank Cannon]

"We now go to Broward County where an attempted theft of an election has been thwarted. We join Officer Krupke and his dog Fleabait on the scene......"

[Free Vulcan]

Good news, but it still worries me that they managed to erase 80+% of Scott's election day lead. They came far too close to stealing it, and that will encourage even more creative shenanigans next time around.

The GOP is I believe still in charge of the state. They need to fix the holes in their election system.

[libertybele]

Good news, but it still worries me that they managed to erase 80+% of Scott's election day lead. They came far too close to stealing it, and that will encourage even more creative shenanigans next time around.

Exactly.  The GOP really needs to wake up on this as well as the RNC; who by the way seemed absolutely useless in all of this. My immediate thoughts is the Supervisor of Elections in both Palm Beach and Broward counties need to be FIRED.  Then the RNC needs to do two things:  Change the primaries in states that have an 'open' primary to a 'closed' primary and push to ensure that they have poll watchers in ALL of the precincts are at least the most vulnerable to voter fraud that report to a team in DC.  The team in DC should be ready to respond to any reports of voter fraud.

Taking steps and precautions to make sure that this doesn't happen in 2020 should be high priority.