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CNN Live Today
Florida Snafu
Aired November 07, 2002 - 11:01 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Up first this hour on CNN, another Florida recount, this time there are no election results or presidential races hanging in the balance, and no hanging chads, but officials in one county did discover more than 100,000 votes that were not counted on Tuesday night.
Our John Zarrella joins us live from Miami with details on this one.
John, good morning.
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Daryn.
I think the first important thing to point out is the fact that it did not affect the outcome of any races at all. In fact, the secretary of state's office, which, of course is in charge of elections statewide told us just a few minutes ago that the system worked the way it was supposed to work.
In other words, when they checked it, they found the mistakes, and then they added the total back in. What happened was that initially some of the early voting that we all heard about in Broward County, where the lines were two, three, four hours long, well, you have to create what's called an absentee precinct in order to tabulate those votes, not a physical thing; it's a computer thing.
So you created, it, but it's capped at 32,000. Well, they exceeded that number of early votes, so they actually had about 34,000 votes that initially, from English-speaking absentee ballots or early voting that didn't get counted. There were another 70,000 absentee votes and Spanish-language votes that kind of fell into the same category. They got tabulated for the individual people, for the individual races, but they never got tabulated into the overall voter turnout count. So that ended up to be about 103,000 total votes that didn't get tabulated into the overall turnout but did get tabulated for the individual races.
So it was more like a spreadsheet error, in one case, and just an error where they didn't quite get the tabulation down in the right place in the other case.
So again, did not affect any races, and what ended up happening, though, was that in Broward County, only had 45 percent turnout. It was 35 percent. You added in this 103,000 votes, went up to 45 percent turnout of voters, but still was the lowest voter turnout in Broward County that they've had in three decades. There's a lot of reasons why. A lot of it may have been the fact that there were such huge lines, the reporting, the media, all the attention given to the fact that there were these enormous lines, scared people away from the polls. A lot of Democratic apathy, apparently, according to political scientists toward their candidates didn't help matters. So Broward County, you know, considered a very strong Democratic stronghold, not help Bill McBride in his quest to overturn Jeb Bush -- Daryn.
KAGAN: Well, with 100,000 votes, it might not count in the overall results, yet still, given the recent history of Florida and recent elections, it certainly does not look good, even if you say it's a spreadsheet error.
ZARRELLA: The secretary of state's office said this is wait the system is supposed to work. It worked perfectly. Yes, there was a computer error, and even a human tabulation error, but exactly what happened, happened. The Broward Canvassing Board did a good job, the secretary of state's office said, and no votes were ever in danger of being lost, and that's the key, according to the secretary of state. So yes, on the face of it, it looks like oh, another red face in Broward County. But according to everybody, including elected state officials who watched this closely at the division of elections. They say the system did what it was supposed to do -- Daryn.
ZAHN: John Zarrella in Florida, thank you so much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired November 7, 2002 - 11:01 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Up first this hour on CNN, another Florida recount, this time there are no election results or presidential races hanging in the balance, and no hanging chads, but officials in one county did discover more than 100,000 votes that were not counted on Tuesday night.
Our John Zarrella joins us live from Miami with details on this one.
John, good morning.
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Daryn.
I think the first important thing to point out is the fact that it did not affect the outcome of any races at all. In fact, the secretary of state's office, which, of course is in charge of elections statewide told us just a few minutes ago that the system worked the way it was supposed to work.
In other words, when they checked it, they found the mistakes, and then they added the total back in. What happened was that initially some of the early voting that we all heard about in Broward County, where the lines were two, three, four hours long, well, you have to create what's called an absentee precinct in order to tabulate those votes, not a physical thing; it's a computer thing.
So you created, it, but it's capped at 32,000. Well, they exceeded that number of early votes, so they actually had about 34,000 votes that initially, from English-speaking absentee ballots or early voting that didn't get counted. There were another 70,000 absentee votes and Spanish-language votes that kind of fell into the same category. They got tabulated for the individual people, for the individual races, but they never got tabulated into the overall voter turnout count. So that ended up to be about 103,000 total votes that didn't get tabulated into the overall turnout but did get tabulated for the individual races.
So it was more like a spreadsheet error, in one case, and just an error where they didn't quite get the tabulation down in the right place in the other case.
So again, did not affect any races, and what ended up happening, though, was that in Broward County, only had 45 percent turnout. It was 35 percent. You added in this 103,000 votes, went up to 45 percent turnout of voters, but still was the lowest voter turnout in Broward County that they've had in three decades. There's a lot of reasons why. A lot of it may have been the fact that there were such huge lines, the reporting, the media, all the attention given to the fact that there were these enormous lines, scared people away from the polls. A lot of Democratic apathy, apparently, according to political scientists toward their candidates didn't help matters. So Broward County, you know, considered a very strong Democratic stronghold, not help Bill McBride in his quest to overturn Jeb Bush -- Daryn.
KAGAN: Well, with 100,000 votes, it might not count in the overall results, yet still, given the recent history of Florida and recent elections, it certainly does not look good, even if you say it's a spreadsheet error.
ZARRELLA: The secretary of state's office said this is wait the system is supposed to work. It worked perfectly. Yes, there was a computer error, and even a human tabulation error, but exactly what happened, happened. The Broward Canvassing Board did a good job, the secretary of state's office said, and no votes were ever in danger of being lost, and that's the key, according to the secretary of state. So yes, on the face of it, it looks like oh, another red face in Broward County. But according to everybody, including elected state officials who watched this closely at the division of elections. They say the system did what it was supposed to do -- Daryn.
ZAHN: John Zarrella in Florida, thank you so much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
