With the vote total quite possibly well below 1,000 (99 percent of the vote is in), Adam Frisch formally conceded to Republican firebrand (and hottie) Lauren Boebert for Colorado’s 3d House Seat.
With Frisch’s formal call earlier to Boebert, the need for a recount won’t be needed. But hyper-technically will still happen. That is unless a certain Colorado bureaucrat exercises some common sense.
As reported by Chris Pandolfo of Fox News (emphasis mine);
More than a week after Election Day, the race for Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District remains uncalled and is likely headed to an automatic recount, but Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert’s Democratic challenger conceded the election Friday.
Boebert held a threadbare lead over former Aspen City Council member Adam Frisch, a Democrat.
As of Friday, with nearly all the votes counted, Boebert holds a 551-vote lead over Frisch out of nearly 327,000 votes cast, a difference of 0.16 percentage points. The Associated Press has deemed the race too close to call and will not do so until a potential recount happens.
However, Frisch took a parting shot aimed directly at the Democratic National Committee;
“The Democratic Party has slowly but surely eroded the trust of rural and working class Americans. Denver and D.C. politicians need to demonstrate an understanding of the issues that face rural America, working class America, and celebrate, not disrespect, folks across the country,” Frisch said.
While Frisch formally conceded, the question remains as far as the mandatory recount.
Denver Post reporter Conrad Swanson (via California’s East Bay Times) gave quite the comprehensive layman’s breakdown of the chain of events for a recount according to Colorado law (emphasis mine);
Despite the two candidates’ acknowledgment of the race’s likely outcome, the matter isn’t yet settled in the eyes of Colorado’s election officials. First, the votes must be recounted.
Because Boebert won by so few votes, Colorado’s election law requires an automatic recount. She had to win by at least 819 votes — a number equal to half of 1% of the top vote-getter’s tally — to avoid an automatic recount, but even then Frisch could have requested one himself.
Here’s how the process works:
First, election officials in the 27 counties covered in Boebert’s district must audit and “canvass” their elections, a process in which bipartisan teams examine voter turnout and determine how many ballots were rejected, fixed or disqualified. The counties have until Nov. 29 and Nov. 30 to report their audit and canvassing reports to the Secretary of State’s Office, respectively.
Secretary of State Jena Griswold can’t officially order an automatic recount in the race until after those reports are in, and she has until Dec. 5 to make the call. Once a recount is ordered, a board of election officials must test the voting machines to be used to make sure they’re counting accurately before they start the process.
The recount process must be finished by Dec. 13 (that deadline extends to Dec. 15 for recounts requested by candidates). Only after that process is finished can the race’s results be certified.
Recounts are unlikely to change the outcome of a given race, though. A statewide recount this summer resulted in a change of 37 votes total, far from the hundreds of votes that split Boebert and Frisch.
Admittedly, I’m no lawyer. But it sure seems to me that the Colorado Secretary of State could simply let this die on the vine.
If certain reports never make it to her desk by any given drop-dead date, the re-count won’t happen.
Especially with Frisch already conceding.