Senator Chuck Schumer on Tuesday encouraged Florida to blow off fast-approaching deadlines to submit vote totals for the Senate race where Republican Rick Scott leads incumbent Democratic senator Bill Nelson by a tiny margin.
“The more time that passes since election day, the better things keep looking for Democrats,” Schumer said at a joint press conference with Nelson in Washington, D.C.
“Supervisors of the elections should have all the time they need to count every Floridan’s ballot,” the Senate minority leader said. “Even if the vote count has to go beyond Sunday.”
Schumer said the deadlines should be ignored since the Senate race does not have an electoral vote in Congress scheduled for December as the 2000 presidential race did when it underwent a recount in Florida.
“We will not have a rerun of 2000, when bullying and intimidation ruled and created a rush to judgement that, to this day, many Americans believe that election was unfairly decided,” Schumer said. “That cannot happen again.”
The Florida governor has a mere 12,562 more votes than Nelson according to the current count.
The state is in the process of a machine recount, the results of which are due Thursday. If a manual recount is required afterwards it must be completed by Sunday.
“It is time for both of them to accept the fact that Floridians elected Rick Scott last Tuesday night,” read a statement by Republican National Committee Deputy Florida Communications Director Joe Jackson said of Schumer and Nelson.
“It’s sad that Nelson will be remembered as a career politician that couldn’t concede gracefully.”
Scott has filed lawsuits against Broward and Palm Beach counties’ elections chiefs over their questionable handling of ballots and failure to report vote totals on time.