I was a child in 2000 and it has been a while since I saw something on this, but I thought one of Bush's arguments was that Gore specifically didn't want to recount the entirety of Florida, which might have given him the election, and what Gore advocated for likely would have led to a Bush win.
The recount law in Florida was dogshit. You had to request a hand recount county by county (there had already been a state wide electronic recount), so Gore got the largest counties and did recounts there.
So Gore got the largest counties and did recounts there.
I’m on Team “I Wish We Had President Gore”, but you don’t honestly believe that was the sole reason he selected those counties, right?
The Gore campaign only requested recounts in large Democratic strongholds. They wanted to pick up blue votes. They sure as hell didn’t request recounts in Hillsbourough County (Tampa) or Duval County (Jacksonville) or the Panhandle.
In hindsight, if the campaign would have requested a statewide manual recount, they would have picked up enough missed Gore votes in red precincts to win. And they probably would have been able to make a stronger case before the Supreme Court to allow a full manual recount.
However, they made a decision they thought would most benefit their campaign, rolled the dice, and lost.
I’m on Team “I Wish We Had President Gore”, but you don’t honestly believe that was the sole reason he selected those counties, right?
Yeah, I should have said, largest blue counties, with the assumption that the electronic error would be uniform across all votes.
In hindsight, if the campaign would have requested a statewide manual recount, they would have picked up enough missed Gore votes in red precincts to win.
That wasn't an option at the time, and he probably didn't have the resources to go to every county and request a hand recount.
And they probably would have been able to make a stronger case before the Supreme Court to allow a full manual recount.
The problem with the statewide hand recount, was that it was a change of the rules after election day.
However, they made a decision they thought would most benefit their campaign, rolled the dice, and lost.
That's all you can do after a point, the good thing is that states saw that shit show and adopted better voting, counting methods, and recount laws.
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u/crassreductionist Oct 16 '24
The worst part is he won the election but got blocked from recounting the entirety of Florida