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vote recount

A federal judge has blocked Jill Stein’s attempt to force a recount in Pennsylvania of votes cast in last month’s presidential election.

The Green Party’s candidate has sought a recount there, as well as in Michigan and Wisconsin. Donald Trump narrowly beat Hillary Clinton in all three states.

Last week a judge halted a recount in Michigan after three days.

Image source Flickr

Image source Flickr

Wisconsin’s is expected to finish on December 12. At issue are fears that voting machines are vulnerable to hacking.

In Pennsylvania, Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton by about 44,000 votes out of 6 million cast – less than 1%.

Announcing his ruling on December 12, US District Judge Paul Diamond said: “There is no credible evidence that any <<hack>> occurred, and compelling evidence that Pennsylvania’s voting system was not in any way compromised.”

Correspondents say that none of the recounts were likely to change the final result.

Hillary Clinton has kept silent on the matter, but her campaign has said it will co-operate with Jill Stein’s recount efforts.

Unlike Wisconsin and Michigan, most of Pennsylvania’s voting machines leave no paper trail. This would have made a recount there a cumbersome process.

Requests would have had to be filed for each individual precinct.

Jill Stein and her party have changed their strategy in seeking a state-wide recount in Pennsylvania.

Her campaign says it will go to the federal courts, hours after dropping an appeal in a Pennsylvania state court.

The Green Party had earlier said voters could not afford the $1 million bond ordered by the state court.

Jill Stein has tried to force recounts in Michigan and Wisconsin as well; all three were narrowly won by Donald Trump.

Image source Flickr

Image source Flickr

The Greens’ decision comes two days before a court hearing was scheduled on the case in Pennsylvania where Donald Trump’s margin of victory was 49,000, or less than 1%.

Donald Trump’s supporters are trying to block the recount bid, which are unlikely to change the polls results if they take place.

“Make no mistake, the Stein campaign will continue to fight for a state-wide recount in Pennsylvania,” recount campaign lawyer Jonathan Abady said in a statement.

“We are committed to this fight to protect the civil and voting rights of all Americans.”

Jonathan Abady said barriers to a recount in Pennsylvania are pervasive and the state court system is ill-equipped to address the problem.

Jill Stein, who was the Green Party’s presidential candidate, says the recount bid is needed to explore whether voting machines and systems had been hacked and the election result manipulated.

Her campaign has so far offered no evidence of hacking, and supporters of Donald Trump have asked the state court to dismiss the case.

A recount has already started in Wisconsin, which Donald Trump won by 22,000 votes. On December 2, a federal court rejected a request by Donald Trump’s supporters to immediately halt the recount there, but allowed a lawsuit to proceed.

In Michigan, Donald Trump’s team filed a complaint with the elections board to block a recount of all 4.8 million ballots cast in the state, which he won by 10,700 votes. A recount there could begin next week.

Hillary Clinton, who lost to Donald Trump, has kept silent on the matter, but her campaign has said it would co-operate with Jill Stein’s recount efforts.

The White House has reacted to Donald Trump’s claim of widespread voter fraud in the 2016 presidential election, saying that there is no evidence to support the allegations.

Press Secretary Josh Earnest dismissed Donald Trump’s unsubstantiated allegations that millions of people had cast illegal votes.

The president-elect also alleged voter fraud in Virginia, New Hampshire and California, states which Hillary Clinton won.

Josh Earnest deferred to Donald Trump’s team for further comment.

Image source Flickr

Image source Flickr

“What I can say, as an objective fact, is that there has been no evidence produced to substantiate a claim like that,” the press secretary told reporters at a White House briefing.

Donald Trump, who won the all-important Electoral College count, aired his grievances with the election result in a tweet on November 27.

“In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally,” he wrote.

Donald Trump’s Twitter outburst comes after Hillary Clinton’s camp said it would support a vote recount in Wisconsin initiated by Green Party candidate Jill Stein.

Jill Stein also notified the elections board in Michigan, where Donald Trump’s 16 electoral votes were certified on November 28, that it would seek a statewide recount of the presidential election results.

Her campaign moved to do the same in Pennsylvania.

Donald Trump won by two-tenths of a percentage point out of nearly 4.8 million votes, making it the closest presidential race in Michigan in more than 75 years.

He is the first Republican presidential nominee to win Michigan since 1988.

Jill Stein’s recount effort was driven by the #recount2016 social media campaign, which has raised over $6.3 million.

During her entire presidential run, Jill Stein’s campaign only raised $3.5 million.

Results would need to be overturned in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania to alter the outcome of the November 8 election – something analysts say is highly unlikely.

Donald Trump has asserted he won the popular vote on 8 November “if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally”.

The president-elect, who won the all-important Electoral College count, offered no evidence to back his claim.

It comes after Hillary Clinton’s campaign said it would support a vote recount in Wisconsin initiated by Green Party candidate Dr. Jill Stein.

Hillary Clinton won about two million votes more than Mr Trump in the popular vote.Hillary Clinton on Donald Trump anti Muslim rhetoric

However, Donald Trump surpassed the required 270 electoral votes to win the presidency. This was based on the state-by-state contests.

In a tweet, the president-elect wrote: “In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.”

In his follow-up tweets, Donald Trump wrote: “It would have been much easier for me to win the so-called popular vote than in the Electoral College in that I would only campaign in 3 or 4 states instead of the 15 states that I visited.

“I would have won even more easily and convincingly (but smaller states are forgotten)!”

Donald Trump also alleged “serious voter fraud” in Virginia, New Hampshire and California – states won by Hillary Clinton – accusing media of not reporting on that issue.

On November 27, Donald Trump reminded Hillary Clinton that she had already admitted defeat, and published remarks from the presidential debates in which she had urged an acceptance of the poll results.

At the time, Hillary Clinton was reacting to Donald Trump’s refusal to respect the outcome.

The Republican narrowly beat the Democratic candidate in Wisconsin, where a recount of the votes was initiated last week by Jill Stein.

Jill Stein also wants recounts in Michigan and Pennsylvania, citing “statistical anomalies”.

The Green Party nominee reportedly wants to be sure computer hackers did not skew the poll in favor of Donald Trump.

Concerns over possible Russian interference had been expressed in the run-up to the vote.

The US government has said Russian state actors were behind hacks on the Democratic National Committee (DNC), a claim denied by Moscow.

Results would need to be overturned in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania to alter the outcome of the November 8 election – something analysts say is highly unlikely.

Hillary Clinton’s campaign has said it will participate in Wisconsin’s recount.

Hillary Clinton’s campaign will participate in a recount of election votes in Wisconsin, a lawyer said.

The recount was initiated by Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein, who is also seeking recounts in Michigan and Pennsylvania, citing “statistical anomalies”.

Election results would need to be overturned in all three states to alter the outcome of the election.

Donald Trump, who narrowly won Wisconsin, called the move a “scam”.

He said it was a way for Dr. Jill Stein – who is funding the recount through public donations – to “fill her coffers with money”.

“The results of this election should be respected instead of being challenged and abused,” the president-elect said.

Photo Getty Images

Photo Getty Images

Hillary Clinton campaign’s general counsel, Marc Elias, said the Clinton team and outside experts had been “conducting an extensive review of election results, searching for any signs that the voting process had been tampered with”.

Marc Elias said there was no evidence to conclude the election was sabotaged, but “we have an obligation to the more than 64 million Americans who cast ballots for Hillary Clinton to participate in ongoing proceedings to ensure that an accurate vote count will be reported”.

He noted that the number of votes separating Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in the closest of the three states  - Michigan -  ”well exceeds the largest margin ever overcome in a recount”.

However, Marc Elias said the campaign would join in “on principle” in the Midwestern states if Dr. Jill Stein follows through on her promise.

Jill Stein reportedly wants to be sure computer hackers did not skew the poll in favor of Donald Trump.

Concerns over possible Russian interference had been expressed in the run-up to the vote.

The US government has said Russian state actors were behind hacks on the Democratic National Committee (DNC).

In a statement on November 25, the Wisconsin Elections Commission said it had received two recount petitions from the Jill Stein campaign and from Rocky Roque De La Fuente, a businessman who ran unsuccessfully to be the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee.

Administrator Michael Haas said the count would begin in the week after Jill Stein’s campaign paid the fee, which the commission was still calculating.

Jill Stein’s campaign needs to raise millions of dollars to cover the fees for the vote recount in all three states.

According to her website, over $5.8 million has already been raised toward a $7 million target. It says this is enough to fund the recounts in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.

Voting rights lawyers John Bonifaz and J. Alex Halderman, who urged candidates to request recounts, have said the “physical evidence” that could signal a cyber-attack needs to be closely analyzed.

However, J. Alex Halderman said the fact that the results in the three states were different from what polls predicted was “probably not” down to hacking.

The deadline for the petition for the recount in Wisconsin was November 25, while Pennsylvania’s deadline is November 28, and Michigan’s is November 30.

Michigan is yet to declare its final results.

Wisconsin provides only 10 electors in the crucial electoral college that gave Donald Trump victory in November 8 election.

Wins there for Hillary Clinton, as well as in Michigan (16 electoral votes) and Pennsylvania (20 electoral votes), would have clinched the presidency for the Democrat.