Election Officials: Joe Scott Still Leading Race For Broward Supervisor Of Elections After 14-Hour Recount
MIAMI (CBSMiami) - In a race that was way too close to call, Broward election officials spent Friday and most of the day Saturday recounting ballots for the Democratic contest for Supervisor of Elections.
As of 5:30 p.m. Saturday, election officials still had not declared a winner but did say Joe Scott was leading.
Scott is a West Point grad with a strong technology background.
There were over 300,000 thousand ballots cast during Tuesday's Primary in Broward.
Officials told CBS4 that they were finally done counting late Saturday afternoon.
JUST IN : The machine recount is complete at the Broward Voter Equipment Center.
Joe Scott takes the lead with 51,600 votes.. Chad Klitzman with a total of 50,976 votes. Details on @CBSMiami pic.twitter.com/lLTN6ZceTZ— Jessica Vallejo (@Jvallejotv) August 22, 2020
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Luckily, officials say, they will not have to do a manual recount.
At the Broward Voter Equipment Center, they counted for hours more than 14 hours in total.
The difference between Joe Scott and Chad Klitzman had been a little more than 500 votes.
"its an absolute nail bitter," said Scott.
"It's very stressful," said Klitzman.
Scott and Klitzman are political newcomers.
Klitzman is an attorney who graduated from Columbia Law School.
Both candidates beat out a crowded field.
"They were looking for a fresh face. They saw the need for change and have a new type of election official. Having someone who came out of politics," said Scott.
"This is a job that should be more apolitical anyway," said Klitzman.
The current Supervisor of Elections, Peter Antonacci, who did not run for the job, was appointed to the job after years of chaotic elections under prior chief Brenda Snipes.
Fourteen thousand ballots were delivered on election day, but 1,500 of them too late to be counted.
The winner will be going to the November general election to face a Republican challenger.
