r/politics • u/slaysia • Dec 19 '17

Democrat wins Va. House seat in recount by single vote; creating 50-50 tie in legislature

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/democrat-wins-va-house-seat-in-recount-by-single-vote-creating-50-50-tie-in-legislature/2017/12/19/3ff227ae-e43e-11e7-ab50-621fe0588340_story.html?utm_term=.82f2b85b50fa
64.6k Upvotes

88% Upvoted

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10.2k

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17 edited Dec 19 '17

11,608 to 11,607

As always, EVERY VOTE COUNTS

2.0k

u/throwaway_ghast California Dec 19 '17

My anus has puckered into singularity.

729

u/Spaceman2901 Texas Dec 19 '17

Truly the blackest of holes.

296

u/InFearn0 California Dec 19 '17

Truly the brownest of holes.

85

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

Truly the brownest of eyes.

18

u/super_aardvark Dec 19 '17

♪ Hey where did we go ♪

3

u/_vrmln_ California Dec 19 '17

♪ The days when the rain came♪

6

u/AdamInChainz Dec 20 '17

The misty hollow is also a euphemism!

2

u/_vrmln_ California Dec 20 '17

For a 🅱ajyna?

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6

u/kaptainkeel America Dec 19 '17

What if black holes are the eyes of some gigantic creature?

2

u/UncleDadd Canada Dec 20 '17

Black eye-holes? Get up on outta here with my eye-holes!

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3

u/timidforrestcreature Dec 19 '17

when you stare into the abyss... the abyss stares back into you....

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3

u/poiuytrewq23e Maryland Dec 19 '17

My special eyes...

3

u/MisterHatred Dec 19 '17

Behind brown eyes.

2

u/selophane43 Dec 20 '17

Balloooon knot. Oh myyyy.

1

u/CobaltRose800 New Hampshire Dec 20 '17

I thought that was EnergyFirst Stadium in Cleveland though.

4

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

May I recommend /r/Bleached_Assholes?

4

u/The_Dog_Of_Wisdom Maryland Dec 19 '17

It sucks in any poor penis that gets near!!!

2

u/MchugN Minnesota Dec 19 '17

Makes it truly hard to resist.

1

u/capron Dec 19 '17

The darkest of seamlines.

1

u/Adamskinater Dec 19 '17

Tight buttblackhole

1

u/[deleted] Dec 20 '17

Nearly puckered as McCain's brow is furled the past year

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2

u/closer_to_the_flame South Carolina Dec 19 '17

How many anuses did you have before?

3

u/sagan_drinks_cosmos Dec 19 '17

Or rather, what was the Schwarzchild radius of the anus in question?

4

u/closer_to_the_flame South Carolina Dec 19 '17

Are you asking me about the size of child anuses? I guess it depends - was Roy Moore around?

2

u/throwaway_ghast California Dec 19 '17

12.

1

u/JohnGillnitz Dec 19 '17

If it puckers, lube it.

1

u/MrRipShitUp Dec 19 '17

Sugar-free gummy bears will help fix that

1

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

this needs to be a Cards Against Humanity white card "my anus puckering into a singularity"

1

u/atmosphere325 Dec 19 '17

singularity

I demand a recount.

1

u/askmatt Dec 19 '17

That’s how brown holes are made

1

u/maux_zaikq Dec 19 '17

I laughed out loud at this in a restaurant.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 20 '17

Well that sounds interesting. Lube up and bite yer lip, I’m going in!

1

u/The-Orig3n Dec 20 '17

Intersmeller

  • Christopher Colon

1

u/[deleted] Dec 20 '17

Can I see it?

136

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17 edited May 12 '20

[deleted]

402

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

There will have to be a power sharing agreement.

But, there is still one district in question, district 28. The Republican leads by 82 votes, there is a recount on Thursday, and there is a hearing on January 5 to decide whether there should be a special election because 350 voters were misaligned in a different district and 147 cast ballots they shouldn't have, thanks to a clerical error by a now-deceased city clerk.

If there is a special election, Democrats will start the legislative session with a 50-49 lead, which should allow them to elect a Democratic leadership for the entire session. Even if there turns out to be a tie, any effort to remove a Speaker would need majority support, which the Republicans will not have. The election will decide whether Democrats have a 51-49 lead or a tie.

213

u/Eldurislol Dec 19 '17

That's given that the Dems are actually assertive with this advantage and don't let it waste away in the name of "fairness". You know the Repubs wouldn't think twice about using this small advantage.

144

u/amlybon Dec 19 '17

Dems already got like 53% of the votes, the fact that it's split like that is solely because gerrymandering.

15

u/hobovision Dec 20 '17 edited Dec 20 '17

Eh, 53% of the votes leading to 50% of the seats really is not too bad. There are many district drawing algorithms that won't lead to a better outcome. Gerrymandering is a huge problem, but it's really when you have a +10% lead to a minority of representation that it can definitely be blamed on partisan districting.

7

u/dittbub Dec 20 '17

depends what % repubs and independants got.

3

u/feanor0815 Dec 20 '17

but reps only got 43% of the vote... so its 10 points difference leading to a split house... this is fucked up! FirstPastThePost is stupid and evil!

5

u/hobovision Dec 20 '17

Well, shit, that's awful. That's exactly what gerrymandering does.

We need to move to some kind of proportional representation. Group like 3-5 reps/senators into one voting district and apportion them as close to the vote as possible.

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u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

I'm tired of the "Democrats are weaklings who are too naive and get taken advantage of by the Republicans" narrative. It's never been true. Democrats actually exploited a parliamentary trick to take the speakership the last time the House was tied in 1997. And it's especially not true this year. Democrats in Virginia, even kindly southern gentleman Ralph Northam, were very tough and played hardball all year.

3

u/OCedHrt Dec 19 '17

What he means is Dems don't blatantly mass sacrifice constituents for funding.

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2

u/Nefandi Dec 20 '17

That's given that the Dems are actually assertive with this advantage and don't let it waste away in the name of "fairness".

The big money donors don't pay the Democrats to be assertive.

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2

u/weakwiththedawn Dec 20 '17

Wow, they killed the clerk responsible? Shits getting real in this country.

/s

2

u/sillysidebin Dec 20 '17

I'd think that even with an unlikely 50/50 situation, some Reps on each side of the isle will flop depending on topic. This has to be sending a message to the Republican party in VA. They called my parents house and I did the survey and said that I'm unhappy with my rep who was doing the survey, because I seriously am.

2

u/John_Durden Dec 20 '17

thanks to a clerical error by a now-deceased city clerk.

WHO THE FUCK IS WRITING THIS SEASON!? Joseph Heller?!

2

u/VisualBasic Dec 20 '17

Damn, did they really have to kill the clerk for making that clerical error?

1

u/gsfgf Georgia Dec 19 '17

50-49 lead, which should allow them to elect a Democratic leadership for the entire session

Interesting that electing a speaker doesn't take 51 regardless, but per Va. House Rule 2 "The person receiving a majority of the votes of the members present and voting shall be deemed to be elected Speaker."

1

u/civilitty Dec 20 '17

The Republican leads by 82 votes, there is a recount on Thursday, and there is a hearing on January 5 to decide whether there should be a special election because 350 voters were misaligned in a different district and 147 cast ballots they shouldn't have, thanks to a clerical error by a now-deceased city clerk.

Christ, did the Daleks nuke the Time Vortex or is this really our timeline?

1

u/Catch_022 Dec 20 '17

thanks to a clerical error by a now-deceased city clerk.

Wow that sounds ominous.

92

u/emptycagenowcorroded Dec 19 '17

All sorts of archaic, long-forgotten rules can kick in..

In Canada in 2015 an election resulted in a tie and was solved by a COIN TOSS!

27

u/BobEWise Dec 19 '17

Nevada decides by high card.

16

u/ThatFargoDude Minnesota Dec 20 '17

That's the most Nevadan thing ever, LOL!

26

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

To be fair that rule isn't common up here. Most jurisdictions and the federal government call a by-election if there is an exact tie.

7

u/Saxopwned Pennsylvania Dec 19 '17

This (different story) happened in the town I grew up in. The mayor of the borough was elected by coin toss and hasn't left office yet.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 20 '17

IIRC that's how Clinton won Iowa. Lots and lots of tied precincts, lots and lots of coin tosses.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 20 '17

I heard that if the coin lands on its edge, the next tiebreaker is to see who can club the most baby seals.

1

u/man_on_a_screen Dec 20 '17

goddamnit, dems gonna lose again.....

2

u/[deleted] Dec 20 '17 edited Dec 21 '17

f

1

u/[deleted] Dec 20 '17

In Canada in 2015 an election resulted in a tie and was solved by a COIN TOSS!

The best part about a tie is that every single person who didn't vote gets to think about the fact that their candidate would have won if only they personally had voted.

125

u/_Reliten_ Dec 19 '17

A little-known colonial tie-breaker kicks in: pistols at dawn.

65

u/RayWencube Dec 19 '17

Most disputes die and no one shoots

3

u/Sithsaber Dec 19 '17

That was with one shot pistols. Imagine two dudes with AR15s in a paintball field.

2

u/Ivy0902 Dec 20 '17

Please have this upvote for the random Hamilton ref.

6

u/JoonWick Dec 19 '17

Hell in a cell!

5

u/GreenShield42 Dec 19 '17

You joke, but one of the Southwest states (I'm pretty sure it's Nevada) resolves a tie with a poker game.

3

u/rooktakesqueen Dec 19 '17

They'd have to go to Jersey.

3

u/saucygit Wisconsin Dec 19 '17

This is Virginia, Virginia is for lovers. Hug... Fade to black.

3

u/letsdocrack Dec 19 '17

#Number 1, The challenge demands satisfaction. If they apologize no need for further action.

1

u/Hyronious Dec 20 '17

Someone beat you to the reference there

2

u/IsThereSomethingNew I voted Dec 19 '17

Can we do it at Busch gardens?

8

u/The-red-Dane Dec 19 '17

Do it in Jersey. Everythings legal in Jersey.

3

u/stevencastle Dec 19 '17

It's a Jersey thing, you wouldn't understand.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

I had a friend who won a city council position on a coin flip as the tie breaker

3

u/Korashy Dec 19 '17

depends. Some places literally do a game of chance like rock paper scissors, blackjack, poker, dice, etc.

3

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

My suggestions:

A rousing game of Twister

Shots, bitches!

Head to head on American Ninja Warrior

"Lip sync for their lives"

1

u/ramacin Dec 19 '17

putin has the casting vote, doesn't he?

1

u/ForgettableUsername America Dec 20 '17

An election this close should really be counted as a tie. Every count and recount has a non-zero margin of error.

1

u/satan93 Dec 20 '17

An article said one rule is that they would flip a coin.

1

u/blowstix Dec 20 '17

If the vote totals were actually tied, there would have been a coin toss.

Seriously.

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u/glasgow_salad Dec 19 '17

Nope, not at all "as always". This is one of those rare cases where a single vote can change the result.

284

u/RE5TE Dec 19 '17

Of the 23,866 votes cast in the Newport News district on Election Day, Yancey held a tenuous lead of just 10 votes going into Tuesday’s recount.

But five hours and much nailbiting later, after painstaking counting overseen by local elections officials and the clerk of court, Yancey’s lead narrowed before it gradually disappeared and then reversed, allowing Simonds to beat him by one vote.

Suspicious that the Republican was slightly ahead before the recount...

870

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

[deleted]

359

u/Phaelin Dec 19 '17

Agreed, I don't think it's healthy to scream "RIGGED" every time the vote goes a way we don't like.

Just look at Roy Moore right now...

58

u/mydropin Dec 19 '17

On the other hand, if our voting machines aren't correctly tallying the votes then that would suggest all votes need to be recounted...

176

u/Fantisimo Colorado Dec 19 '17

23 out of 23k is a super small margin of error. This was a very unlikely event

100

u/DothrakAndRoll Oregon Dec 19 '17

Which again is why we have recounts for close wins. System at work!

4

u/MinosAristos Dec 19 '17

How are we sure the recount is accurate enough to call it?

12

u/DothrakAndRoll Oregon Dec 19 '17

I'm only going by the recount policy and procedures they follow in a recount, which is a lot more involved than the initial count as it says in the article.

8

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

Well if whenever a recount was triggered the actual human counted tally was significantly different from the machine count then that would call into question the accuracy of the machine count in general.

But if its only 1 in 1000 wrong/discounted then we can be reasonably sure that the machine counts are more than accurate enough for elections in which someone wins by a large margin, and we have this system (human count) in place for when its too close to trust the machines.

Basically as long as the automatic recount figure is larger than the machine error ratio then its safe and expedient to use the machines with the human count as a fall back option.

5

u/tedmeat Dec 19 '17

Not to be pedantic, but the error in this case was 1 in 10,000, which I feel a lot better about

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u/krangksh Dec 19 '17

Pretty sure every state has its own recount rules so this is a question with 50 answers. There are serious concerns with the way votes are tallied throughout the country, but in this particular case there are very, very few elections that are remotely as close as this one so this level of mistake almost never has the power to affect the outcome. Even Franken's first extremely close first election had a margin more than 10x larger.

3

u/uwhuskytskeet Washington Dec 19 '17

Virginia's law could be different, but some states allow another recount if it's funded by whoever asks for it (the initial loser in basically every case).

Washington's gubernatorial race in 2004 wasn't decided until two recounts.

2

u/oldbastardbob Dec 19 '17

Russian hackers hit that 0.1% margin of error right on the head (before the recount), eh?

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u/badger0511 Michigan Dec 19 '17

Which is why there are thresholds for mandatory recounts. The voting machines had a 0.096% error rate in this race. There's no justification to recount every race with that low of an error rate.

3

u/capron Dec 19 '17

There's no justification to recount every race with that low of an error rate

Assuming that error rate is consistent to all other races.

2

u/fezzuk Dec 19 '17

Why would a digital system have any error rate?

2

u/that1prince Dec 20 '17

Literally every damn thing has error.

6

u/db82 Dec 19 '17

Thank goodness software doesn't have any bugs. Never ever.

8

u/alexthealex Dec 20 '17

Not just software. Software that reads hand-filled forms.

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u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

It was 0.1% of the vote that was off.

Yeah recounting would be nice. But it’s expensive and if the difference is 1,900 votes the odds that the election changes when there’s 15-30k votes is so minuscule it’s not worth the money (and by that I mean we’d know there’s an issue election night anyway).

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u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

It's impossible to count votes with 100% reliability. There will always be errors. The key is to do what you can to keep those errors small, and fall back to a more precise (but more expensive and time-consuming) procedure when the margin of victory is within the margin of error.

1

u/noizu Dec 19 '17

i'd be more concerned with large gaps in exit polling numbers.

1

u/CANOODLING_SOCIOPATH Connecticut Dec 19 '17

No, the margin of error is small enough that unless the electoral outcome is extraordinarily close the probability that the machines got it wrong is near zero.

That is why we do automatic recounts when an election is extraordinarily close.

It is basically impossible to build a machine that is 100% accurate 100% of the time. But it is possible to make a machine that is 99.9% accurate 100% of the time. That way if the margin of victory is .1% or less we go into automatic recounts. As in those cases we can't of 100% certain of the results.

Also, when the machine makes the 1 out of a 1,000 error it is just as likely to make the same kind of error in reverse in the next thousand votes. Thereby cancelling out its own errors.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

It's all about margins of error, which is why recounts are typically only triggered when the margin is sufficiently low.

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u/closer_to_the_flame South Carolina Dec 19 '17

Well if states kept the records of the vote, that wouldn't be nearly as much of a problem. I'm looking at you, Georgia. The numbers in Ossoff's race didn't feel right. There was a race the same day in South Carolina that swung way more heavily to the Democrat's favor (though being in upstate SC, he still lost). And Georgia is maybe the state who seems to be doing the most to obscure the process and avoid transparency.

So I agree, just shouting "rigged" every time we lose is stupid. But there are some cases where I honestly think we're getting screwed. I still think Al Gore won the presidency back in the day.

2

u/Phaelin Dec 19 '17

I do think Gore was robbed, and Ossoff may have lost either way, but the official count is shady as hell

1

u/[deleted] Dec 20 '17

Yeah, that's .01%. To me, I can accept that margin of error to trigger a recount. You can't be perfect.

1

u/Scaryclouds Missouri Dec 20 '17

I literally don't even understand why someone would yell "rigged" at this, at least with the result going our way. If it was rigged, wouldn't the people rigging it had made sure they still won, or better yet not required a recount in the first place? Just seems odd. While ideally an error rate of 0 is preferable an error rate of .1% is hardly cause for concern, especially as we have systems in place well before a race would be within that margin of error.

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u/VintageSin Virginia Dec 19 '17

And remember this was because it was already within an impossible to see margin of error, like .05%. People like to scream that if a vote is with 1% that it needs a recount, but the fact of the matter anything outside of .5% is statistically insignificant.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

Exactly, we've already had what, 2 other pretty close races recounted and they weren't even close to flipping. This one was just insanely close to start with.

1

u/steenwear America Dec 19 '17

yea, that is 1 mistake for every 2090 votes, so a mistake rate of .04%

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u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

[deleted]

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u/captainAwesomePants Dec 19 '17

It's good, but your bank is much, much more accurate. Its balance sheets aren't off by a few hundred bucks every day.

38

u/IsThereSomethingNew I voted Dec 19 '17

Sometimes it is.. they call it "banking errors" and automatically collect it from your account when you owe them money. When they owe you money on the other hand...

6

u/sezit Dec 19 '17

but every bill and coin is not hand made.

Dollars and coins are standard. Individually filled out ballots are unique. Is the mark light? is it a little outside of the square? was the ballot torn and didn't process? Lots of opportunities for misreads.

4

u/Genesis111112 Dec 19 '17

dunno I have heard of banks crediting peoples accounts with millions.... as they say accidents happen for good or bad.

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u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

0.00048 x Your bank balance = ...

Would you notice that amount missing?

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u/brownieman2016 Dec 19 '17

Well yeah, your bank has countless internal and external auditors ensuring its financials are exactly right. That's not cheap. And they still sometimes make mistakes. Not worth it on elections where margins are much higher than the automatic threshold (1.5% I think? Or maybe 0.5%? - actually probably depends on where you live)

2

u/CANOODLING_SOCIOPATH Connecticut Dec 19 '17

Banks often make small mistakes. But these mistakes are then fixed.

But the balance sheets aren't off a few hundred, but are off a penny or two.

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u/ForgettableUsername America Dec 20 '17

Not that I disagree with your last point, but even the recount has a margin of error that is greater than one vote. A second recount could easily swing the other way. There may not be any practical way to determine who won.

This election should probably be regarded as statistical tie.

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u/Amannelle Kentucky Dec 19 '17

If it's by such a small number it's not really suspicious. Just how things go.

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u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

Suspicious? Really? Because this is what recounts are for.

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u/ignorememe Colorado Dec 19 '17

Not really.

If you think about it, Trump got his birthday wrong on his mail-in ballot for NY. Melania messed hers up too. Kushner voted as a female. And don't even get me started on how often they have to update security clearance forms.

Republicans are not good at paperwork.

4

u/mercset Dec 19 '17

Republicans are not good at paperwork.

Then why are they in charge of all the important paperwork? I feel like this is bad thing. I mean they literally wrote the tax bill in the margins as they were passing it

6

u/ratbuddy Dec 19 '17

Bob Corker, a guy who was in the midst of denying any nefarious intent in the #CorkerKickback, claimed he didn't even understand the provision in question, that you'd have to get an accountant to explain it to him. How the fuck are you gonna vote for a bill you don't even understand? Bunch of assholes, that's how.

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u/SlipstreamDrive Dec 19 '17

Suspicious? Hell, I think that's damn impressive that it was that accurate.

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u/LB_Allen Dec 19 '17

By 10 votes? Yeah, that's some conspiracy.

79

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17 edited May 11 '19

[deleted]

31

u/Risley Dec 19 '17

Roll Tide

1

u/sezit Dec 19 '17

Well, Newport News is in Tidewater Virginia.

6

u/Phaelin Dec 19 '17

Can confirm. Dyuh-huk.

2

u/Korashy Dec 19 '17

back to back election losers.

2

u/Mortimer14 Dec 20 '17

Couldn't have been from Alabama, they were needed there to beat out the pedo. Maybe they were from West Va. or DC.

26

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

How is it these important seats are left up to such low turnout? Holy shit.

55

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

Ask the people who don't show up

15

u/Risley Dec 19 '17

Well someone’s got to watch Dancing with the Stars.

17

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

I disagree. No one needs to watch it

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u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

"Something something both sides are the same...."

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u/BurkeyTurger Virginia Dec 19 '17

They had roughly 45% voter turnout going by VPAP's numbers. So below the national average but definitely not the worst.

https://www.vpap.org/offices/house-of-delegates-94/district/

4

u/Sports-Nerd Georgia Dec 19 '17

Do you know how many people live in this district?

18

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

About 52k voters if I remember right. Just under 50% turnout. Not bad for an off year.

3

u/protendious Dec 19 '17

An odd-year at that, not even falling on a federal midterm.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

We did have a Gubernatorial election though, so that did help the numbers a bit.

Turnout like that in 2019 would be crazy.

3

u/greg19735 Dec 19 '17

that's great turnout for a december election.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

Well, it was a November one, so it's not as big as a special election (they just didn't get around to recounting it until now).

But yeah, it's still pretty solid turnout for an off year. The Governor's race being a big deal did help though.

2

u/IsThereSomethingNew I voted Dec 19 '17

50% at worst... Some people may have abstained from voting for that position and only voted for governor (I do this for judges sometimes if I don't know them). Was the total vote cast equal to the same as the total vote cast for the governor in the same district?

6

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

How do they deal with these situations? If you count twice and get slightly different numbers each time where one says one person wins and the other says the other person wins, how do you know which vote is correct? Can't there be errors in both counts?

3

u/BristolShambler Dec 19 '17

That sounds like the Council election in Parks & Rec...

2

u/Smarag Europe Dec 19 '17

It makes perfect sense because you except a difference of thousands so the first gount is not done with as much care.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

Not really. This means they made a mistake on 0.05% of ballots, which isn’t unreasonable at all.

1

u/gdshaffe Dec 19 '17

It's really, really not.

If someone is going to take the enormous risk of developing the means to affect voter tallies by any amount at all, they're for damn sure going to change it by more than double-digit votes, else they're taking an enormous risk for virtually zero chance of it mattering.

This is also the main reason we know that claims of widespread in-person voter fraud are bullshit, by the way: because almost no one is going to take the enormous personal risk of committing the crime of attempting to vote more than once, when there's an almost zero chance of that vote making the difference in an election.

1

u/Ayn-Randy_Savage Dec 20 '17

Suspicious

Yeah, pretty sure we're gonna see a lot of this in the rest of the midterms.

Republican slight leads edged out once all discrepancies are removed.

Republicans are a discrepancy...

1

u/xCesme Dec 20 '17

I counted votes in our local county in Netherlands for our general elections in march, we only had to count about 900, with 15 people in total. It’s very easy to make mistakes. Our final count was wrong 5 times until after an hour of rechecking everything we finally found the mistake and fixed it. These things happen. Still weird though that their final count was off by that much.

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u/Saxojon Dec 19 '17

These numbers needs to be repeated every single time there is an election.

1

u/Bocephuss Dec 19 '17

Yea but if it's repeated to everyone then couldn't you potentially send the vote the other way?

People that vote, vote. People that don't, don't.

Is there a big difference of non-voters on one side of the isle v. the other?

3

u/Saxojon Dec 19 '17 edited Dec 20 '17

From what I've understood it's the democratic voters that needs the kick in the butt. Republican voters are reminded about this from their pastors etc. all the time. The apathy is a consequence of people not thinking that their vote matters and this is the best example of that it does.

2

u/daniel_ricciardo Dec 19 '17

Never count yourself out. Your vote is priceless.

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u/slakmehl Georgia Dec 19 '17

Or yet more evidence that the writers for this timeline are hacks.

2

u/BradleyUffner I voted Dec 19 '17

This is great news, but the logical part of me wanders "What if it was the recount that was wrong?"

For something this close, we need multiple independent recounts, where a majority of the recounts produce the exact same number.

2

u/ailee43 Dec 19 '17

how long before the opposing party demands a recount.

1

u/gex80 New Jersey Dec 20 '17

A recount was already done. Thay how they got the 1 vote difference result

1

u/TenTonApe Dec 19 '17

This is the second time an election has come down to a single vote in the last few months in the states. Every vote counts.

1

u/sarcasmandsocialism Dec 19 '17

Well, the hundreds that went 3rd party and the dozens that were write-ins don't really count. That is, they don't count any more than the people who didn't bother voting.

1

u/TheSilverNoble Dec 19 '17

Every person that had a lot else to do that day, that saw a long line and thought about walking away but didn't, every person who talked themselves into it, even though they were sure their vote wouldn't matter... good job y'all.

1

u/NotTheOneYouNeed Idaho Dec 19 '17

I wonder if anyone will ever know who the very last vote was. Rhe one that actually decided which person would win the seat.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

23,866 out of 79,429 people voted or about 30%.

Every vote counts but it sure would be nice if EVERYONE voted. 30% is pitiful.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '17

What was the turnout %, those numbers seem so low.

1

u/ClunkiestSquid Dec 19 '17

I know they went somewhere... but where exactly did the other 651 votes go?

1

u/SquirrelOnFire Dec 19 '17

... Except in the presidential race, in which case just stay home.

1

u/DeOh Dec 20 '17

Except your implying that the last few votes that tip the scales are the only ones that count by pointing at these close tallies. Everyone wants to be a hero that tips the scales.

1

u/douchbagger Dec 20 '17

To be fair, it's pretty rare that any vote determines an election. In this case, however, they all did.

1

u/Alphamatroxom Dec 20 '17

Except the presidential vote

1

u/man_on_a_screen Dec 20 '17

as always? that's simply not true. its a nice bumper sticker, but it doesn't actually represent reality. this is a complete outlier which is so noteworthy because of how incredibly rare it is.

1

u/Seroto9 Dec 20 '17

Really? No one is demanding a fucking recount? I thought I'd never see that day again

1

u/swim711crazy Dec 20 '17

This is my district!!!

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