VA-SEN: We May Not Know Who Controls The Senate Until Next Month
With a recount looking likely in the race between Dem Jim Webb and GOP Senator George Allen, it looks as if we may not know who won the Virginia Senate race -- and possibly which party controls the Senate -- until next month. This morning's New York Times reports:
While a recount seems likely, though, if it comes it will not come quickly.According to a statement issued this month by the state’s Board of Elections, no request for a recount may be filed until the vote is certified, which is scheduled to happen this year on Nov. 27th.
After certification, a losing candidate has 10 days to file a recount request in the state courts. The petition will be considered by a panel made up of the Chief Judge of the Circuit Court in Richmond and two judges appointed by the Chief Justice of the state Supreme Court. Those judges then set out guidelines for conducting the recount...Last year, a recount involving the race for state attorney general did not begin until Dec. 20th.
Webb is leading Allen by around one-third of a percentage point with 99.75% precincts reporting, meaning it's all but certain that Allen will be entitled to a recount. See you next month.
I haven't heard definitively whether or not the latest vote tally includes absentee ballots. I know it does not include provisional ballots that are expected to be counted today. Anyone know anything about this?
November 8, 2006 9:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
What are we doing to protect the ballots and ensure a fair recount?
---- Just say no to 0 ratings. Especially from petey, the ratings abuser.
November 8, 2006 9:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Here is a link to the Virginia election results: http://sbe.virginiainteractive.org/
Note that as of 9:30 AM, all but 4 precincts had reported. This does not include provisional ballots, as far as I understand from the way those ballots get counted. The counties do report the absentee ballot counts. (In fact, some of the missing precincts are absentee precincts.)
You can find the precinct level returns using the county drop-downs and then clicking on "view results by precinct."
2 of the 4 missing precincts are:
Fairfax City- absentee
Isle of Wight County- Raynor precinct
CNN shows Loudon as incomplete, but the election results page shows all precincts in. CNN must be misreporting two of the counties as 100%, since only 2439 of the 2443 precincts have been tallied.
November 8, 2006 9:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
Typo: "Last year, a recount involving the race for state attorney general did not begin until Dec. 20th." should read "Last year a recount in the race for Attorney General was not resolved until Dec. 21."
November 8, 2006 10:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm not sure why a recount should be considered inevitable here, unless it's because Allen is that much of a loser. There aren't 8000 votes to wring out here even if he could take them all which when looking at what's left he'll be lucky to split them. My guess is he'll concede once it's at 100% reporting and he's still down 8000+ votes.
There've been closer races already called and only a total "Macaca" would commit political suicide contesting an election he has no chance of winning.
November 8, 2006 10:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
I thnk you're right. If it were one- or maybe even two-thousand votes, he'd take the state-funded recount, but seven or eight thousand votes would be an insane number to hope to flip.
Of course they may find a couple of never-before-discovered counties in the hills of the Shenendoah (Republicham and Felix County) whose votes have yet to be counted. ;-)
November 8, 2006 11:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
Who chairs Senate committees if the Senate is divided 50-50? are chairmanships split between the 2 parties??
November 8, 2006 12:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
I bet that if someone looked through newspapers from November and December 2000, I bet someone could find an obnoxious George Allen quotation urging Gore to give up the recount. Somehow, it probably involved a lame football metaphor.
November 8, 2006 12:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
No, "shoot dem lawyers" Cheney gets to cast the deciding vote. I wouldn't worry about that though, there may have been a small chance that Lieberman would've caucused with the repugs if his vote were the decider but it's doubtful that he would do that now to force a Cheney vote.
November 8, 2006 12:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
If the Senate was split 50-50, the Republicans would completely control it because they'd have Cheney (to break tie votes) even if they had to wheel him in from his undisclosed location. They wouldn't split anything and would stack committees with extra Republican senators to ensure control.
Thankfully it's 51/49 but it's still very tenuous. Let's all hope that some Democratic senators don't decided to change parties and flip it to the Republicans. It has happened in the past. Maybe some Republicans can be flipped to give the Democrats a larger cushion of votes.
November 8, 2006 11:38 PM | Reply | Permalink