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Still trailing by 23 votes, NC Senate leader asks for hand recount

The leader of North Carolina’s upper legislature is demanding a recount after a machine tally showed him lose something controversial Republicans entered the primary for the state Senate seat with 23 votes.

North Carolina Senate Leader Phil Berger (R) asked the state’s Electoral College In a letter on Friday Hand counting in one example voting precinct in Senate District 26.

The state’s election rules give the board discretion to allow candidates to request samples or complete eye counts following a machine recount in close races.

“Not only does manual review eliminate the possibility of machine error, but such review is also essential to ensure equitable treatment of these ballots in this contest,” Berger said in his defense Friday. he wrote.

The original election night tally showed Berger losing by just two votes. The candidate supported by President Trump noted that a total of 222 ballots were removed from the machine count after being marked as overvoted or undervoted.

“These uncounted ballots, which may include discernible votes for candidates, are nearly ten times the margin in this contest,” Berger wrote. “If the machines misread just some of these ballots, then the current results of the election may be wrong.”

State election officials will randomly select 3 percent of voting precincts and early voting sites for a partial hand count and can order a full recount if that count finds significantly different results. News and Observer.

“While I believe a verbatim recount of all votes is necessary here, I would at least ask the State Board to order a verbatim recount of votes read by tabulators as overvotes and undervotes,” Berger wrote in his Friday letter.

The Senate leader is running against county sheriff Sam Page in the Republican contest.

In a statement Following Berger’s initial recount request earlier this week, Page expressed confidence that he would continue to come forward in the race against the incumbent state lawmaker.

“We won this election because voters in Guilford and Rockingham counties made their decisions clear,” he wrote on social platform X on Tuesday. “Phil Berger has the right to request a recount and I’m confident it will confirm the result. We won.”

North Carolina’s electoral college is scheduled to meet Wednesday to certify election results, but the winner of the GOP primary is not expected to be announced.

Board spokesman Jason Tyson said: News and Observer A statement on Friday said the board does not plan to add Berger’s request for a hand count to the agenda for Wednesday’s meeting.

“The state board stated at its meeting last week that it would follow the recount process established by state law,” Tyson said.

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