Sources: Hand count to be requested in Congressional race

Miriam RafteryPublished: Monday July 3, 2006

The San Diego County Registrar's office has notified election integrity advocates that the deadline to request a manual hand count will be on Wednesday due to the 4th of July holiday tomorrow, which would have otherwise been the deadline for filing, RAW STORY has learned.
“This is not about Busby or Bilbray. This is about November and the entire election,” Brad Friedman of Bradblog.com told residents of San Diego County at an emergency town hall meeting in Oceanside, California on June 28th.

Bilbray was sworn into Congress following the special election in the 50th Congressional District, despite the fact that thousands of absentee ballots remained uncounted. According to the Registrar’s office, Bilbray nosed out Busby 49.57% to 45.02% in the final tally, which was certified late Thursday on the eve of the 4th of July weekend.

The holiday-eve certification posed a major hurdle for activists, as California law allows only five days to file for a hand count or challenge. However, sources tell RAW STORY that the Registrar has extended the deadline to Wednesday, given the holiday.

At the Oceanside event, Friedman, who is the co-founder of Velvet Revolution, a voting reform movement, called for a hand-count of ballots and urged that San Diego Registrar of Voters Mikel Haas be held accountable for allegedly lax security procedures, including allowing poll workers to take home voting machines with programmable memory cards up to two weeks before the election. Under state law, violating the chain of custody for voting machines decertifies the machines.

Sources tell RAW STORY that a hand count request will likely be filed Wednesday. >>>cont

Link Here