Election 2000: Florida Recount Deadline Looms; Palm Beach County Keeps on Counting
ANDRIA HALL, CNN ANCHOR: And so, now we want to take it live to Bill Hemmer, who is standing by in Tallahassee. Reaction, Bill?</s>BILL HEMMER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Andria, good afternoon from the Florida capital. A few housekeeping notes to bring you up to date on right now. We know that Katherine Harris, the secretary of state, is inside the administrative building here, inside of her office, is said to be meeting with lawyers at this time. She arrived about 25 minutes ago. It's also my understanding that Bob Crawford, the second of three members of the canvassing commission will arrive at any moment. Clay Roberts, the head of elections here in Florida, the third member of that team, he's been here, they say, since the early morning hours today. So all three members, again, inside at work today on this Sunday afternoon. Now, what we do understand at this time is that 10 counties have amended their votes at this point, one of which is Broward, that turned in their results at 9:30 a.m. this morning. You may remember last night it was about midnight when they finished up the recount there in Broward. Again, they are in as of 9:30 a.m. this morning. Now, to the matters of certification -- before I go into the following explanation, I want to make it quite clear that through talking with attorneys here in Tallahassee and reading the opinion delivered by the state Supreme Court on Tuesday night, it's quite clear on page 40 the following scenario could or could not happen. The state Supreme Court told the secretary of state and the canvassing commission that they must accept amended votes here by 5:00 this afternoon, no later than 9:00 a.m. tomorrow if the office is closed, but now we know the office is open today. It did not say that the canvassing commission must certify those votes -- a fine distinction there, I'll explain in a minute. But here is what we believe if certification goes on as planned over the next two to three hours. We do believe on the 18th floor here, where the elections division is located, that the amended returns come into that office, and there is a staff set up there for Clay Roberts, who heads up that particular office here in Tallahassee. They will make a rough draft of the returns, send them down to the secretary of state's office, through which she will go through with her attorneys and legal advisers to tell them what they believe about those votes and the results they are looking at. If they approve, they'll send it back up to the elections division upstairs, it'll be put in a final draft form and at that point the canvassing commission will proceed to the basement and the cabinet room down here, and here is what we believe may happen through that. Thank you, Faray (ph). Eleven counties are in right now, I'm just being told. Much appreciated, thank you very much. So it's 11 now and not 10. Let's get back to the point about certification later tonight, though. We believe right now they are talking about five different copies. Why five for certification? One, they say, is going to go to the state museum in Florida, the other will go into the records division here at the secretary of state's office, and then all three members of the canvassing commission will get a copy for themselves. Now, back to the matter as to whether or not certification may or may not over the next two, or three, or four hours. And speaking with attorneys well placed within the state officials here in Tallahassee, they cite a law in Florida statute here, Section 102.131, that states -- I'm quoting now -- "if returns appear irregular and false, the canvassing commission shall not include returns in its certification." In other words, if the commission looks at these numbers and don't believe that they are true and regular, but rather irregular and false, it is possible that they may take those returns and set them to the side. Again, this is a scenario here. We have no proof that this may or may not happen. But again, that's what we are looking toward later tonight. Certification is expected, is thought to be taking place later tonight, but again, nothing firm and true on that. Only time will tell. And, Andria, once again, throughout this entire process, it is quite clear that what we have expected and what we have predicted sometimes, in many cases, is far from the truth. We'll be here to watch it live in Tallahassee. Back to you now in Atlanta.</s>HALL: That expected being the unexpected. Bill Hemmer live -- thank you so much, Bill. Now to Gene.</s>GENE RANDALL, CNN ANCHOR: Except for a brief break overnight, they have been recounting ballots around the clock this weekend in Palm Beach County, Florida. CNN's Bill Delaney is following developments in West Palm Beach -- Bill.</s>BILL DELANEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Gene, from Tallahassee, we just heard time will tell and indeed the clock is ticking away here. So far as anyone knows here, this is all over in two hours. They are still counting in the emergency operations center behind me and they have asked for an extension, but we don't know whether they are going to get it. Now, just outside the gates here today, Gene, we have a very active and vocal group of a couple of hundred protesters, perhaps the biggest group we have seen in the past couple of days. They are for the most part good-natured, but I have to tell you there's an undercurrent of intensity about these protesters, there's real emotion here. It will be interesting to see what happens -- depending -- what happens when we finally do get some sort of a final count, some sort of a verdict here. Not completely spontaneous demonstrations, Gene -- I was told by a resident of Palm Beach County here that she received a taped phone call last night urging her to come out and protest -- not crystal clear to her just which side was urging that. But there are some organized protesters out here besides people who may be coming just spontaneously to express their emotions at this very emotional juncture. Now, inside the emergency operations center, as I said, the counting goes on. Unbelievable that these people have been in there since 8:00 yesterday morning with just a very brief, apparently, two hours or so nap really last night -- continuing to count. The numbers are elusive as to just how much more they have to count. We heard an estimate about an hour ago, about 1,500 disputed ballots still to be counted. Now, if you do the math, you don't have to be a mathematician to figure out that by 5:00, it would be very unlikely they would get 1,500 ballots counted. We estimate that would mean they would have to count about 10 ballots a minute, they are certainly not doing that. But I don't want to say by any means they are not going to make it -- they are trying very hard to. Judge Roberts just about two hours ago came out, held a press conference. That was when he requested the extension from the Florida secretary of state of this deadline.</s>JUDGE CHARLES BURTON, PALM BEACH COUNTY CANVASSING BOARD: The canvassing board is committing -- is committed to reviewing each and every one of these questionable ballots as quickly as humanly possible, including working through this evening. We do not believe this extension would prejudice the state in any way in light of the Florida Supreme Court's opinion.</s>DELANEY: We now await like everyone else in Florida, everyone else in the country and indeed everyone else around the world, Katherine Harris. The secretary of state of Florida again in the eye of the storm, we expect some kind of a statement from her pretty shortly, and everybody here is just waiting to see whether that means this thing is over in two hours here, or whether it extends into the night or into the morning. Back to you.</s>RANDALL: Bill, thanks very much -- Andria.</s>HALL: Well, in Palm Beach, may be a sense of immediacy, but in Broward County, a sense of relief, where the hand recount ended overnight. CNN's Susan Candiotti has that part of the story. Susan, do you hear anybody snoring yet?</s>SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: No, not from here, Andria. Twenty four hours ago, the area where I'm standing was filled with demonstrators virtually all protesting the recount process. Now, only a handful of protesters come and go. And a few people stopping by simply to take photographs of the building where the Broward County Canvassing Board worked until midnight last night. Not long ago, the chairman of the Broward County Canvassing Board, Robert Lee showed up to clean up his courtroom. No rest for Judge Robert Lee. He has a trial starting first thing in the morning and came in this afternoon to personally straighten things up, including moving furniture back into its place. He is aware of the criticism by some who call the process outrageous and outlandish, especially when it comes to deciding a voter's intent on those dimpled ballots. He defends the board's methods as consistent and trustworthy.</s>JUDGE ROBERT LEE, BROWARD COUNTY CANVASSING BOARD: If you actually sat through like we did and reviewed 50 to 100,000 ballots that you actually completed, these issues are very obvious. They are not guessing. Anything that we had to remotely guess on we decided not to count. We erred on the side of not counting many ballots that probably could have been counted, but we wanted to be as fair as possible.</s>CANDIOTTI: As for this afternoon, Judge Lee says he has every reason to believe that Secretary of State Harris will accept the results sent to Tallahassee, hand delivered there this afternoon by the canvassing board; otherwise, he says, he would hate to see the hard work of hundreds of people in Broward County here wasted. Susan Candiotti, CNN, reporting live in Fort Lauderdale.</s>HALL: Susan, thank you.