Decisions, drama in Miami-Dade

This is how the county found itself in the middle of the suit that might decide the election.

[AP photo] Republican Party observers Bruce Tague, center, and Elizabeth Ross, a staff assistant in the office of the U.S. Senate majority leader, demonstrate outside the Miami-Dade elections office on Nov. 22.

By DAVID ADAMS

© St. Petersburg Times, published November 29, 2000

MIAMI -- It was on the morning of Nov. 8 that Miami-Dade Supervisor of Elections David Leahy got word the election wasn't quite over. He would be doing a recount.

After 23 years in the job, it was a task he was familiar with. But he had never done one this big. He was also aware a machine recount might turn up "hanging chads" and other surprises.

But there was no way he could have predicted the political maelstrom about to engulf his offices on the 19th floor of the downtown Miami-Dade government center.

Over the next two weeks Leahy and his two colleagues on the election canvassing board would have to make a series of decisions amid mounting tumult.

Those decisions, and the atmosphere in which they were made, are now the focal point of a post-election legal challenge that could determine whether Vice President Al Gore moves into the White House as president. They are being scrutinized closely by lawyers, journalists, politicians and voters struggling to weigh whether Gore's challenge has merit.

'A fight against the evil empire'

The morning after the election most eyes were on Palm Beach County, where the butterfly ballot confusion was the big news. But Dan Ricker, publisher of Watchdog Report, an Internet bulletin on Miami's political scene, could see trouble brewing here.

"This campaign has been neck-and-neck all the way. Both sides are looking at it like a fight against the evil empire."

For the first few days the machine recount went smoothly, turning up a only a handful of additional votes for Gore.

Later in the week the canvassing board decided to do a test hand recount of 1 percent of the ballots. They moved to a larger conference room on the 18th floor, where counting tables were laid out with plenty of room for observers and media to watch the process.

Republican legal challenges went nowhere. GOP lawyers were frustrated by the canvassing board chairman, Judge Lawrence King, a Democrat.

"That's when we started calling our grass-roots leaders and asked them to be on standby," said Luigi Crespo, South Florida field director for the Republican Party.

The party was well-placed to respond. For the last six months the GOP had been running its statewide campaign out of offices in Miami.

"In Miami-Dade we had staff working 24 hours pretty much. We had a lot of people in our database," Crespo said.

It wasn't just Miami party officials who realized the urgency.

"We had people calling from different states, calling to volunteer their efforts," Crespo said. "They were saying, " "We want to help. Where do we go?' "

Democrats were doing the same. In the second-floor cafeteria of the government building, both parties set up holding areas where observers were briefed on recount procedures.

By the time the sample recount was over on Nov. 15 it registered only a six-vote change for Gore, and the canvassing board voted 2-1 against doing a countywide recount.

Republicans were jubilant but remained on alert. "When the count was called off we knew it was not over," Crespo said.

Indeed, the Democrats quickly moved into legal overdrive, asking the canvassing board to reconsider. They argued that six votes in 1 percent of the precincts could mean as many as 600 countywide, more than enough to turn the election. Palm Beach and Broward counties had already agreed to do manual recounts. How could Miami-Dade refuse?

Republicans protested that Democrats were cherry-picking precincts that heavily favored Gore. The system wasn't fair, they said, and anyway the votes weren't there.

When the canvassing board met on Friday, Nov. 17, the Democrats prevailed. Their arguments convinced Judge Myriam Lehr, a board member who like Leahy has no party affiliation, to change her vote.

The count was back on.

The Republicans challenged again. But at hearing in circuit court the next Tuesday, Judge David Tobin rejected Republican arguments to stop the recount.

Hours later the Florida Supreme Court issued its own ruling. Manual recounts could continue. But it imposed a deadline of Sunday, Nov. 26, at 5 p.m.

In Miami-Dade, the manual recount had proceeded, with Gore picking up a surprising number of new votes. By the night of Tuesday, Nov. 21, with 139 of the 614 precincts counted, Gore had gained 157 votes.

With Gore picking up few votes in Palm Beach County, but with bigger gains in Broward, the Miami-Dade recount suddenly took on new significance.

Republicans realized they had to shift focus again.

The Miami-Dade GOP team had by then already received reinforcements from Bush headquarters in Austin, Texas, and campaign staff from other states armed with cell phones and walkie-talkies.

On Monday, Nov. 20, a traveling GOP war room -- a large mobile home adorned with "Sore-Loserman" posters -- had arrived from from West Palm Beach.

While Crespo continued to direct local volunteers, Austin was now running the show.

"Decisions were being made somewhere else," he acknowledged.

An angry crowd gathers

The Florida Supreme Court deadline had placed Miami in a hole. With Thanksgiving only 24 hours away and the weekend looming, that gave only two working days to count 654,000 ballots.

It couldn't be done. But Leahy had a solution. The next morning, Wednesday, Nov. 22, he assured the board he could speed up the process by using computer software to separate "undercounted" ballots on which voting machines were unable to detect a vote for president.

By his estimate there were about 10,750 of those. There ought to be enough time to do a hand count of those, even if it meant working on Thanksgiving.

The board agreed.

Republicans were outraged and demanded that any hand recount include all ballots.

Cell phones and beepers came alive.

In order to conduct the undercount vote the board decided to move operations back to its 19th floor offices, where the 13 computerized ballot scanning machines were kept in a small room. The limited space allowed for a far smaller contingent of observers and media.

Republicans, and some members of the media, complained the board was violating Florida open government laws by excluding them.

Cuban radio stations in Miami that day had also warned listeners that Democrats were poised to steal the election. Listeners were told that by opting not to do a full manual recount, their heavily Republican districts in Little Havana and Hialeah wouldn't be included.

Meanwhile, GOP phone banks were making recorded voice "robo-calls" to get out the party faithful.

By mid-morning an angry crowd had gathered outside the government building. The crowd included top Republicans, including local Cuban-American members of Congress Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Lincoln Diaz-Balart.

But it was the out-of-state contingent that was the most vociferous.

"Thugs in that building are trying to hijack this election," the crowd was told by U.S. Rep. John Sweeney, R-N.Y.

According to one published report, Sweeney issued the decisive battle cry. "Shut it down," were his words to an aide, according to Wall Street Journal columnist and conservative commentator Paul Gigot, who was present.

Within a short time, some 40 to 60 GOP observers -- mostly from out of state -- moved en masse to the 19th floor tabulation room, chanting "fraud, fraud, fraud," and "three blind mice."

Some pounded on the doors and jostled with security guards.

Leading the charge was Elizabeth Ross, a 26-year-old staff assistant from the office of U.S. Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss. Another was Thomas Pyle, who works for House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, R-Texas. Both staffers were also among a crowd that set upon Miami-Dade Democratic Party chairman Joe Geller.

Geller was shoved and pushed as he left the tabulation room with an unused sample ballot. Screaming insults, the crowd accused him of stealing an actual ballot.

"This Republican observer -- a woman with blond hair, a suit and clipboard -- was watching the whole thing," Geller said. "But the moment I started to walk away, she sicced the crowd on me. She said I was stealing a ballot and they surrounded me. It was all orchestrated."

As Geller made a dash for the elevator, the crowd followed.

"Suddenly, I was surrounded by a screaming, shoving, insane crowd, shouting that I had done something I hadn't done, that I should show them the ballot," Geller said. "People grabbing at me and my clothes and there was almost no security. I couldn't believe those people weren't arrested."

The actions of Ross and others have led to charges from Democrats that the assault on the tabulation room was a "near mob-like action" by "out-of-state paid political operatives."

Lott's office said Ross was not acting on orders from her boss.

"She was on vacation time when she was down there. She wasn't on the senator's salary," said Lott spokesman Sam Whitfield.

A few hours later, the canvassing board members did what that the protesters had been hoping for. In a stunning reversal, they unanimously voted to call off the recount.

Democratic lawyers are looking into allegations of intimidation of both Geller and the elections board as part of their contest of the election result.

"This proves it was not local people who were ignoring the law. They were being whipped up by outsiders," said Ben Kuehne, a Democratic attorney from Miami.

Republicans deny the protest was choreographed. They do acknowledge that a number of Capitol Hill staff were flown in as volunteers, some with their expenses paid.

"It was not orchestrated. People calling us fascists and a paid mob, that's very irresponsible," Crespo said. "This is not Al Sharpton and the Rev. (Jesse) Jackson. That's not the way we operate. There's staff, and then there's volunteers, and then there's gung-ho volunteers."

But the board's sudden reversal inevitably raised questions.

Democrats insist the atmosphere in the building was so explosive they had to evacuate about 50 of their observers out a side door.

"It was a really scary moment," said Chad Clanton, a Democratic National Committee staff member. "We feared for their safety. We felt we had to get our volunteers out of the building to protect them."

'It was all about logistics'

Leahy and the other board members deny the protest had any effect on their decision. "There were logistical concerns," he explained. "I don't think it was feasible."

However, Leahy said the protest did make him aware of a public perception that the partial recount was unfair. Added to that was a written complaint by some in the media demanding better access to the count. "Over time it hit us," Leahy said. "We were hit by concern in the news media that we were not being fair and we could be taken to court."

All along Leahy appeared the least enthusiastic about conducting the manual recount.

"He's a standard bureaucrat," said Ricker, of Watchdog Report. "He does things in a government way. He's just trying to do his job and get out."

Election officials insist the final decision boiled down to whether or not there was time to move the entire counting operation to the larger conference room on the 18th floor.

"There was not enough room to the 19th floor," said Robert Ginsberg, the county attorney. He dismissed Republican protests that counting the undervotes was unfair or even illegal. "It was all about logistics," he said.

Officials said it would take at least a day to move the 13 machines to the 18th floor and reset the computers. That would leave possibly only three days to count thousands of ballots.

As they realized the scale of the obstacles, Ginsberg met individually with each of the board members.

"Late morning, David (Leahy) called me in. He said, "I think I can't give any guarantee that come the deadline Sunday that we'll be in any position to certify,' " Ginsberg said.

By then nerves were fraying. "I think they were tired," said Ginsberg. "But I think they were capable of making this decision in an intelligent and reasonable way."

Officials concede, however, that the Republican protest was not a welcome sight.

"They were very aggressive," said Mayco Villafana, the county spokesman who was present throughout. He described the scene as "a somewhat intimidating and violent display."

But he denied it affected the board's decision.

Democrats continue to suspect that it was not all a matter of logistics. They point out that the vote-counting task Miami faced was no different from that which officials in Broward and Palm Beach counties were dealing with.

"It was not a legal decision," said Kuehne. "It was not based on the facts. It was based upon something we have yet to understand."

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