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Date Published: November 6, 2004
Leventis ups lead in hearings
Recount still necessary since Senate margin less than 1
percent
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Photos by Chris Moore / The
Item
Sumter County Election Commission workers
Lucinda Macias, foreground, and Louvena Dinkins sort
ballots during a provisional ballot hearing Friday at
the Sumter County Courthouse. Sen. Phil Leventis,
D-Sumter, increased his lead over challenger Dickie
Jones by 23 votes after the results were tallied. |
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By LESLIE CANTU
Item Staff Writer
lesliec@theitem.com
State Sen. Phil Leventis, D-Sumter, increased his lead
over Republican challenger Dickie Jones by 23 votes during the
provisional ballot hearing at the Sumter County Courthouse on
Friday, giving him 55 votes more than Jones.
The unofficial
tally now stands at Leventis 15,632, and Jones 15,577. Since there
is still less than 1 percent difference, the state will order a
recount after the South Carolina State Election Commission certifies
the results Thursday.
Local election commissions will hold
the recount, which must be done in both Sumter and Lee counties.
Garry Baum of the state election commission said his
commission would work with local commissions to decide on a good
time to hold the recount. Recounts are usually done as soon as
possible, he said, and will be done in both counties at the same
time.
Leventis said he feels good about his position in the
race.
"I would hope that the machines were accurate the
first time, which I take it they are," Leventis said. "Our election
commission displayed an awful lot of competency and
professionalism."
J Cabot Seth, Jones' law partner, also
applauded the election commission.
"I'm impressed with how
the process works, the conscientiousness of the commission and how
much work they've put in," Seth said.
He wouldn't speculate
on what action the Jones campaign might take.
"We've not made
any decisions and can't really until the recount," Seth said.
Goliath Brunson Jr., the chairman of the Sumter County
Election Commission, said he doesn't remember holding a recount in
the six years he's been on the board. He doesn't expect a major
change in the tallies, though, because of the commission's
meticulous work election night.
The local election
commission considered 230 provisional ballots and 56 fail-safe
ballots, grouped according to problem, at its meeting Friday. It
decided to count 50 of the provisional ballots. The 56 fail-safe
ballots counted for nationwide, statewide, countywide and citywide
races, but not for the state Senate District 35 race.
The
Lee County Election Commission considered 14 fail-safe ballots and
20 provisional ballots Friday morning. Those ballots yielded 7 votes
for Leventis and 7 votes for Jones, keeping the challenger's lead in
Lee at 257 votes.
At 10 a.m. in the Sumter County
Courthouse, more than 50 people squeezed into chairs in the small,
increasingly warm room on the second floor, with more people
standing against the walls and spilling out into the hallway.
Leventis took a seat front and center. Jones did not attend the
hearing, but his campaign manager, Jay Jones, and Seth attended in
his stead.
The crowd listened quietly for almost an hour
through the explanations accompanying each ballot and the
commission's ruling on each.
Vice chairman Carol Ann Rogers'
motion to throw out the very last ballot provoked an outburst of
disapproval from the crowd, though. The ballot was an absentee
ballot from a member of the military stationed in Iraq who failed to
have his envelope witnessed. The audience thought a special
dispensation should be made for someone in a war zone, but
commissioner Cindy Macias explained the reason for the
ruling.
"We are required, by law, to require a witness to all
absentee ballots that come in," Macias said. "This is a very
sensitive situation, but I believe by law we have no choice but to
sustain the challenge."
The commission confronted a range of
problems, including people registered in other counties who
attempted to vote in Sumter, people who voted in the wrong precinct,
misspelled names on the voter rolls, and a father whose name was
mistakenly removed from the rolls when his son moved out of Sumter
County.
Only one challenger appeared to speak to the
commission.
Ralph Baker challenged a ballot at the St. John
precinct because he believed a poll worker was giving too much
assistance to a curbside voter.
"The poll worker had the
voter's hand in their hand, guiding the stylus," Baker said. "It
seemed to me the poll worker was rendering much more assistance than
was legitimate in that case."
The commissioners decided, by a
4-2 vote, to allow that vote to count. Charles Moore and Keith
Schultz voted to throw out the ballot.
After about an hour,
the commissioners began to separate the approved ballots into
precincts to be counted.
Those who thought they would
quickly learn how many votes to add to Leventis and Jones' tallies
were instead quickly disappointed. The commission had to count each
ballot by hand.
The process took about a minute and a half
for each ballot, with time in between as the commissioners shuffled
paperwork to change districts. Macias would start by reading out the
precinct, congressional district, state Senate district, state
representative district, County Council district and school board
district of the ballot.
Ears in the crowd pricked up each
time she said the ballot was from state Senate District 35. If the
ballot was from state Senate District 36, audience members waited
out the reading by fanning themselves with their notebooks or
whatever else was handy.
Macias read the votes by number, so
audience members had to readjust themselves to listen for numbers
instead of names. People soon figured out that "17" meant a vote for
John Kerry, so the rest of the ballot would probably include a vote
for Leventis. A write-in vote for Jomarie Crocker for Sumter County
auditor meant the voter most likely voted for Jones.
Pens
hovered over notebooks as lawyers and party activists waited for
Macias to read through the votes for president, U.S. Senate and U.S.
representative and get to the state Senate 35 race. More often than
not she said "54" and pens across the room ticked off another hatch
mark for Leventis.
Macias read the last provisional ballot
at 1:05 p.m. At the end of the day, Leventis had 27 new votes and
Jones had 7 new votes from the provisional ballots. Leventis also
gained 5 votes from faxed military ballots and Jones gained 2 votes
from faxed military ballots.
Contact Staff Writer Leslie
Cantu at lesliec@theitem.com or
803-774-1250.
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