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Machine recount done, partial hand-eye tally to go, Democrat still leads in NC Supreme Court race

Candidates for N.C. Supreme Court. Incumbent Justice Allison Riggs, left, a Democrat, and challenger, Republican Court of Appeals Judge Jefferson Griffin.
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Candidates for N.C. Supreme Court. Incumbent Justice Allison Riggs, left, a Democrat, and challenger, Republican Court of Appeals Judge Jefferson Griffin.

The statewide machine recount completed by all 100 counties in North Carolina has confirmed what the official post-election canvass showed: Incumbent Democrat Allison Riggs leads Republican challenger Jefferson Griffin by 734 votes in the race for an associate justice seat on the N.C. Supreme Court.

But the contest is far from over. Under state law, Griffin, a judge on the N.C. Court of Appeals, is entitled to a hand-eye tally of ballots from a percentage of randomly selected Election Day precincts and early voting sites in each county. Should enough discrepancies between the partial hand-eye recount and the machine results indicate the outcome could change, then Griffin would get a full, statewide hand-eye recount.

According to a state elections spokesman, all counties should complete their partial recounts by Friday. Then, it would probably be early next week when the state elections board determines whether enough discrepancies between the machine and partial hand-eye recounts exist to warrant a full, statewide hand-eye recount, which could take weeks to complete.

Meanwhile, in addition to the recounts, Griffin and the N.C. Republican Party are pursuing separate election protests in their quest to turn around the results of this contest.

Griffin's campaign has challenged more than 60,000 ballots across the state for a variety of alleged violations. The protests claim ballots were cast by people disqualified by felony convictions, by absentee or early voters who subsequently died before Election Day, and by people who did not register properly.

Additionally, Griffin is challenging ballots allegedly cast by overseas citizens who never resided in North Carolina but whose parents are eligible voters. Counties are considering some challenges this week; the state elections board will take up challenges over alleged improper registrations and ones involving overseas voters next week.

Embry Owen, Riggs' campaign manager, told WUNC recently that Griffin's protests were a "last-ditch effort to the deny the will of voters across the state."

But Paul Shumaker, a consultant with the Griffin campaign, said the dramatic turnaround in the vote count over the course of the post-election county canvass is reason enough to warrant the ballot protests.

On Election Night, Griffin led Riggs by around 10,000 votes. During the county canvass — the 10-day post-election period during which local elections boards validate provisional and absentee ballots, conduct hand-eye counts of ballots from randomly selected precincts, and reconcile voter check-in data with ballots cast — that lead flipped to the slim edge for Riggs.

Shumaker, a GOP political consultant for more than 40 years in North Carolina, said that change was the most drastic, and unexpected, turnaround he has seen in his career.

However, results at the end of Election Day are always unofficial and never certified until after the county canvass. In 2020, recounts in another state Supreme Court race confirmed Republican Paul Newby's victory over then-incumbent Chief Justice Cheri Beasley by just over 400 votes. Beasley conceded after the machine and partial hand-eye recounts solidified Newby's win. She did so with some election protests she filed still pending.

Rusty Jacobs is WUNC's Voting and Election Integrity Reporter.
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