Forget Denmark, something’s rotten in St. Lucie county, Florida

**Posted by Phineas

Gee! I get to vote twice? Cool!

I mean, with such a well-managed election operation as this, I can’t see why anyone thinks there’s a problem:

Then there is Gertrude Walker, the 32-year-veteran election supervisor of St. Lucie County, who has spent much of the last two weeks explaining why her office completely botched the count. She admitted that her office had acted in β€œhaste” in issuing election results, and that β€œmistakes were made.” Among her mistakes was failing to count 40 of the 94 precincts under her jurisdiction on Election Night β€” and then counting the other 54 twice. Indeed. On Friday, her office announced it had β€œdiscovered” 304 additional early votes left in a box. None had been counted

(Crossposted at Public Secrets)

But Walker wasn’t available for comment. She has been hospitalized for unknown reasons.

The news was one reason that Florida’s secretary of state has dispatched a team of experts to audit St. Lucie’s procedures. The St. Lucie Election Canvassing Board voted to approve a complete recount of all the early ballots. It began the recount on Saturday but stopped it at 8 p.m. because the county building’s security system was set to be switched on later that night. Some people complained that the alarms have been switched off in the past to allow county business to continue after hours, but their complaints were ignored. The recount resumed on Sunday morning, but it missed the noon deadline to submit the county’s final returns to Florida’s secretary of state.

So, on Sunday, the previous resultsβ€”the ones showing Democrat Murphy aheadβ€”were sent to Florida’s secretary of state for certification.

How convenient that this “glitch” means St. Lucie’s returns also cost Rep. Allen West his seat.

Read the rest of John Fund’s article for more on Ms. Walker’s troubling history. Florida has a serious problem with its elections, and owes it to the voters to clean this up.

Addendum: Disappointing news from Legal Insurrection. Thanks to the slow-walking of the recount by Walker’s office, Congressman West may have few legal avenues left and may be preparing to concede defeat. Democrats should remember the warning words of Obi Wan Kenobi.

(Crossposted at Public Secrets)

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