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Entering the realm of the recount
KTVU's Tom Vacar explores what to expect from recounts as part of the 2020 election.
It is possible we could be entering post-election recount season with several states in a sort of re-race that may well delay the inevitable outcome.
This is the realm of election law. Over the last half century, the record of recounts is crystal clear.
"Recalls rarely change the final outcome, at least let's say, for a statewide race," said national election expert, University of Minesota Law Professor David Schultz.
He says a recount entails nothing more that running the ballots through the counting process again, period.
Some states have an automatic recalls for razor-thin elections while others require the candidate to ask for a recount.
They can request that, but then it's going to cost the candidates, said Schultz.
In all of the still undecided battleground states, it's been more than 20 years since a losing candidate became the winner by recount. Back in 2016, there was a Wisconsin recount of the Trump-Clinton election that Trump won by 20,000 votes. The recount went in Trump's favor by just 131 votes, reconfirming his victory.
In Arizona, a decade ago a local judicial race changed by 66 votes, no change to the actual outcome as was a case in Georgia six years before. There have been other recounts in Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Wisconsin; all with unchanged outcomes.
As to the current Presidential race, the law mandates that elections must take place on a certain date, the President asserts that anything counted after that date, is invalid even if state allows it.
"The lower courts have not been sympathetic and I doubt the Supreme Court would be sympathetic either. Courts will almost never, ever overturn an election unless the evidence is so overwhelming that the election was corrupt," said Schultz.
The Trump campaign and Republican party have begun filing lawsuits over the vote, alleging fraud in some states. In early rulings, judges have already dismissed some, citing a lack of evidence of wrongdoing, while ruling in Trump's favor in Pennsylvania where the campaign sought closer access to observe election workers.
Likewise, the Trump campaign has called for a recount in Wisconsin, which officially was declared for Biden. An automatic recount is likely in Georgia too where the counting continues and the margin is so narrow it will likely trigger a second tally of the ballots