June 15, 2010

Salter: County will recount GOP votes Thursday

By Scott Wright

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CENTRE — Cherokee County Probate Judge Melvyn Salter this morning told The Post that the county will conduct its recount of the June 1 Republican primary for governor on Thursday. 

“We’ll begin at 8 a.m. and we figure it will take six to eight hours,” Salter said. “We hope to have results by the end of the day.” 

According to totals supplied by Salter’s office, the official count for the top four Republican gubernatorial candidates on June 1 was as follows: Robert Bentley-400, Roy Moore-398, Tim James-292, and Bradley Burne-247.  

Last week, Salter told The Post he expects the recount to cost around $2,500.

Most of the state's 67 counties planned to recount ballots Tuesday. Several other counties will recount ballots Wednesday.

Across the state, only the Republican vote for gover­nor will be recounted, and that process requires hand-­feeding each ballot into a voting machine.

Vote totals reported June 1 and provisional ballots counted last week show Bentley ahead of James by just 167 votes. Bradley Byrne finished well ahead of the pack, but no candidate received a majority. That means Byrne and Bentley will meet July 13 in a runoff -- even if the recount results in James moving ahead of Bentley in the vote total.

That's because Attorney General Troy King, in a con­troversial opinion issued last week, said James cannot challenge the June 1 vote re­sults until the GOP has a gubernatorial nominee. That nominee will not be se­lected until the July 13 run­off.

At that point, James could contest the primary vote to the Republican Party senior state leadership. If the party found for James, then it would have to set a second runoff -- this one between James and the winner of the Byrne-Bentley July 13 show­down.

That scenario is keeping Republican Party state Chairman Mike Hubbard from getting a good night's sleep.

"It's a potential mess," said Hubbard. "All we can do at this point is follow what the attorney general says is the law and the rec­ommendations of the secre­tary of state and then see what we see. If the recount shows Bentley still in the lead, then I guess this is all over. If the recount shows James pulling ahead, then all I can say is, hold on."