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Bush Camp Asks Court to Stop Florida Hand Recounts
Lawyers of US Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush asked Florida's Supreme Court on November 19 to stop the hand recounts in several Democratic- leaning counties.
The state deadline of November 14 for the counting of votes had passed and any more recounting should stop, argued Bush's lawyers, who filed papers with the Florida Supreme Court ahead of Monday's key court hearing.
"It would be highly inequitable to keep the state and the nation on hold to finish a manual recount when the responsible officials failed expeditiously even to begin the process," the lawyers wrote.
They said in the 64-page filing that three South Florida counties where hand recounts are under way could have conducted recounts before the deadline.
The county election boards "had a statutory duty to appoint enough counting teams to get the job done by the deadline," they said.
The legal team of Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore, who filed their papers with the state Supreme Court on Saturday, argued that Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris had delayed proper recounting in the counties.
The seven justices of the Florida Supreme Court will decide whether the hand recounts should continue in the three South Florida counties and their results be included in the state's final tally.
Florida's Secretary of State Katherine Harris announced that she would reject any manual recounts results, but the state Supreme Court ruled on Friday that she cannot certify election results until it holds a hearing on Monday afternoon.
Bush and Gore are fighting for the 25 electoral votes of Florida, which will decide the outcome of the U.S. presidential election.
Gore, who trailed Bush by 930 votes in Florida after the state' s official but uncertified count was announced on Saturday, hopes that the hand recounts will overtake Bush's lead.
Hand recounts continued over the weekend in Palm Beach and Broward counties. Miami-Dade County is scheduled to begin hand recounting on Monday and continue until December 1.
Local press reports said with 316 of the 609 precincts counted in Broward by midday on Sunday, Gore had gained 88 votes.
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