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Tuesday, Nov 24, 2009
The Florida secretary of state says she might accept hand recounts -- but then again, she might not.
Nov 14, 2000 | For a woman who doesn't seem to think we have a second to spare before the winner of Florida's presidential contest is declared, Secretary of State Katherine Harris sure takes her time getting to her 5 p.m. press conference on Tuesday.
Finally, at 7:35 p.m. she walks in -- dress, lipstick and pumps all precisely coordinated to the same regal maroon hue.
Harris has taken her share of hits in the last few days. She's been tarred by Democrats as a "hack," a "lackey" for Gov. George W. Bush, and as "acting in the finest tradition of a Soviet commissar," in the words of Chris Lehane, a spokesman for Vice President Al Gore. According to Gore campaign chairman William Daley, "the Bush campaign and Secretary Harris have engaged in a variety of tactics to block or to slow this count: lawsuits in federal court, unfounded orders by the secretary of state."
And indeed, Harris's earlier statement that she would refuse any recount numbers that arrived in her office subsequent to the Tuesday close-of-business deadline was applauded by the Bush campaign -- whose Florida effort she co-chaired, and on whose behalf she visited New Hampshire during primary season last January.
Additionally, Harris wrote a letter to the state GOP chairman -- one released to the public at large, mind you -- in which she questioned the very legality of hand recounts taking place when there was no evidence of computer malfunction. This put an immediate end to the Tuesday hand recounts in Palm Beach and Broward counties. The Gore campaign, joined by the state's leading Democrat, attorney general Bob Butterworth -- Gore's state chairman -- had argued that the ballots' not registering every hole punched (the fabled "hanging chad" of unrecorded, or "undervoted," ballots) was necessity enough for the recount. For both actions, Harris received gator-sized rhetorical chomps from Dems up and down the peninsula on Tuesday.
That said, Harris seems calm and collected as she walks in to tell the world that all 67 counties have filed their returns as of Tuesday at 5 p.m., and according to those returns Bush leads Gore by 300 votes -- 2,910,492 to 2,910,192.
The deadline that has just passed was fiercely contested. Democrats had sought an injunction granting an extension to three largely Democratic counties -- Palm Beach, Miami-Dade and Broward -- that requested extra time to hand recount their results. Harris had maintained that the law didn't allow her to do so.
But earlier Tuesday, Leon County Circuit Court Judge Terry Lewis slapped both the Democrats and the Republicans (if only such a slap could be literal and not figurative!), denying the Democrats' request for an extension but also dissing Harris for shirking a decision that he ruled was indeed within her power to make.
Harris had earlier argued that only an emergency like a hurricane would allow her to extend the deadline. "But a close election," she had written, "regardless of the identity of the candidates, is not such a circumstance; the law provides for automatic recounts, protests and manual recounts, and it plainly states when this process must end." In his ruling, however, Lewis disagreed.
At her press conference this evening, Harris acknowledges Lewis' decision and leaves open the possibility that she might, in fact, accept later hand-recount totals if they come -- though she offers no guarantee.
The three Democratic counties "may be contemplating submitting amended returns based on manual recounts not completed as of today's statutory deadline," Harris says.
"Within the past hour, the director of the Division of Elections" -- Clay Roberts, a Harris appointee and also a Bush backer -- "faxed a memorandum to the supervisors of elections in these three Florida counties," she continues. "In accordance with today's court ruling confirming my discretion in these matters, I am requiring a written statement of the facts and circumstances that would cause these counties to believe that a change should be made before final certification of the statewide vote."
The final certification will come Saturday, after the midnight Friday deadline for overseas absentee ballots. The deadline for the excuse letter from the three counties is 2 p.m. Wednesday, Harris says.
"On advice of counsel, I will not take questions because of pending litigation," she says. And the litigation does indeed pend.
