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Deadline battle
© St. Petersburg Times, published November 14, 2000 In the end, the courts will decide when to stop counting the votes that will determine whether George W. Bush or Al Gore wins Florida and the presidency. A circuit judge in Tallahassee will rule this morning whether all votes must be counted by 5 p.m. today except for those from overseas. Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris, the state's top elections official and a co-chair of Bush's Florida campaign, said that is the deadline the law requires her to follow. The Texas governor wants that deadline enforced because it could prevent including all of the hand-recounted votes for president in four counties won by Gore. The vice president wants the courts to allow all of the hand recounts to be completed before the statewide results are approved. Leon Circuit Judge Terry P. Lewis won't have the final word. His ruling today is expected to be immediately appealed. But whether Florida counties have beyond this afternoon to complete their hand recounts is a pivotal question. Volusia County may be finished today, but Palm Beach County won't. Miami-Dade County won't decide whether to pursue a hand recount until today. Meanwhile, the canvassing board in Broward County voted Monday evening not to conduct a countywide hand recount after receiving a written opinion from Harris that was requested by Florida Republican Party Chairman Al Cardenas. The decision would be a significant setback for Gore, who won the county by more than 200,000 votes. A sampling of three Broward precincts and almost 3,900 votes found just four more votes for the vice president. Democratic Party officials said Monday night they will go to court today to try to reverse the canvassing board's decision. Bush lost one attempt to stop all of the hand recounts Monday. U.S. District Court Judge Donald Middlebrooks in Miami rejected Bush's request for an order that would have stopped the recounts. As the court hearings and hand recounts plodded along, Gore and Bush each attempted to portray themselves as defenders of accurate vote counts and their opponent as an obstacle. The vice president's team argued that the only fair way to determine the winner of Florida is to rely on the hand recounts. Gore, conveying an image that he is above the trench warfare, appeared relaxed and smiling as he issued a short statement Monday outside the White House. "There is something very special about our process that depends totally on the American people having a chance to express their will without any intervening interference," the vice president said. "That is really what is at stake here and so that is what I am focused on -- not the contest but our democracy, to make sure our process works the way the founders intended it to work." Bush, who remained secluded on his Texas ranch, argues that he has won two mechanical recounts in Florida. His lawyers and advisers contend that hand recounts are unfair, subjective and prone to errors. Fairness, they said, requires accepting the mechanical recount results by this afternoon's deadline and adding the overseas ballots on Friday to determine the winner. Bush Communications Director Karen Hughes aggressively responded to Gore's statement and defended today's 5 p.m. deadline. "The vice president essentially said we should ignore the law so he can overturn the results of this election," Hughes said in Texas. Until the courts sort out the situation, the race for president remains too close to call and Florida's 25 Electoral College votes remain up for grabs. Gore still leads in the national popular vote and has won 262 electoral votes from 19 states and the District of Columbia. Bush has won 29 states and has 246 electoral votes. It takes 270 electoral votes to win the presidency. New Mexico remains too close to call, with Bush leading by a handful of votes. But that state's five electoral votes are not enough to decide the presidency. Bush won the first Florida mechanical count by 1,784 votes. An unofficial tally of the second mechanical recount indicated Bush's lead shrank to 388 votes out of nearly 6-million cast. "I would not want to win the presidency by a few votes cast in error or misinterpreted or not counted," Gore said. "And I don't think Gov. Bush wants that either." The end-game strategy for both sides remains fluid. Gore's team will not rule out returning to court. Bush could continue to battle in court or seek additional hand recounts in other Florida counties if the hand recounts continue in counties won by Gore, although it may be too late pursue hand recounts. But the Texas governor also could seek recounts in states such as Iowa, Oregon and Wisconsin that Gore narrowly won. First the fight for Florida must be decided. Early Monday morning, former Secretary of State Warren Christopher and Gore campaign manager William Daley met for less than 10 minutes with Harris. Christopher later called the meeting "brief and businesslike" but labeled Harris' decision a "move in the direction of partisan politics." Harris told the men she believes state law requires the state canvassing board to certify the election results by 5 p.m. today, except for the overseas ballots. She said she only has discretion in cases of natural disasters, not close elections. "The process of counting and recounting the votes cast on Election Day must end," Harris, who campaigned for Bush in New Hampshire, said afterward. The secretary of state's ties to Bush and his younger brother, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, immediately drew fire. "For the first couple days the Bush people were trying to give the American people the bum's rush and now they have their hack," Gore spokesman Chris Lehane said. Harris' decision prompted Gore to join Volusia and Palm Beach counties in Leon Circuit Court to argue that today's deadline is unfair. Over two sessions lasting a total of three hours, the two sides fought before a packed courtroom. Dexter Douglass, the former general counsel for Democratic Gov. Lawton Chiles, took issue with a Division of Elections opinion. The opinion says that state law provides for a delay in certifying election results only in "unforeseen circumstances" such as a hurricane, not in close elections. "This is a bark-splitting North Florida cyclone" with a hurricane attached to it, Douglass argued. "It's one that rips across the entire nation." He said the law is "no gray area. It's a red, white and blue area." Barry Richard, representing Bush, argued that court should stay out of the controversy. "This court is being asked to question the Legislature and the constitutional officer," he said. Earlier Monday at the other end of the state, Bush's lawyers argued in federal court that Florida's system for hand recounts was flawed and that citizens in other counties would have their votes unconstitutionally diluted. "The process is selective, standardless, subjective and inevitably biased," said Theodore Olsen, Bush's lawyer. Countered Bruce Rogow, a law professor at Nova Southeastern University representing Palm Beach elections supervisor Theresa LePore: "Is it messy? Does it go on and on in some fashion? Yes, it does. But that is what democracy is all about." Middlebrooks, who was appointed by President Clinton, ruled against Bush and concluded the issue was not one for the federal courts. As the court hearings took center stage, the hand counting continued in Volusia, Palm Beach and Broward. Democrats dropped their request for a hand recount in Osceola County. In Volusia, there was some doubt whether the hand recount could be completed today. "Unless they bring in the 101st Airborne, I don't know how they can get it all counted," said Volusia County Court Judge Michael McDermott, head of the county canvassing board. Volusia's canvassing board tried to determine what voters meant when they filled in bubbles on the county's president ballot. Voters darken in bubbles on the ballots like students taking an SAT test. Some voters checked the bubbles or put a X through them, instead of darkening the bubbles in. Others filled in one bubble, then crossed the bubble out and circled a different bubble. Another 320 ballots in Volusia that had not been counted were found late Sunday. The mistake happened when the computer that counts votes went down for two hours on election day and stopped accepting ballots. The precinct clerk tried to call the election office in DeLand to report the problem, but she couldn't get through. From the 320 ballots, Bush gained 181 votes and Gore gained 129. "It is embarrassing to have national attention focused on us because of this process," county government spokesman David Byron said. "This is a modern, progressive county government. This is not a shoe-string operation." In Palm Beach, county officials predicted it would take until Sunday to count by hand more than 400,000 votes for president. The counting will start this morning with 25 teams of counters working in seven-hour shifts. The partisan tension was apparent Monday. Bush supporters suggested that County Commissioner Carol Roberts be removed from the Canvassing Board because she had a Gore sticker on her car and attended a Gore political function. Roberts countered that Harris, the secretary of state, is a Bush supporter. U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Palm Beach, said today's deadline that Harris intends to enforce would steal the election from voters in his district. "The secretary of state is attempting to call the election in Florida before each Floridian has a chance to have his vote counted," Wexler said. "What is the Bush campaign afraid of?" -- Times staff writers Bill Adair, David Adams, Jean Heller, David Karp, Lucy Morgan, Shelby Oppel and Thomas C. Tobin contributed to this report.
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From the Times election desk From the AP national wire  |
