Rick Scott wants the state police to seize the voting machines

The top Florida government officials are increasingly putting pressure on the state police to participate in the counting of polls in South Florida, while Governor Rick Scott clings to Bill Nelson at the report of their US Senate Contest of National Significance.

Scott's campaign lawyers filed urgent motions on Sunday asking election supervisors in Palm Beach and Broward counties to hand over their voting machines and ballots to the enforcement department. Florida law and the sheriff's deputies during periods when the vote was not counted. The motions come a few days after Scott claimed that "unethical Liberals" in both counties were trying to steal his election after reports in late development narrowed his margins on Nelson and forced him to a recount in progress throughout the state.

Also on Sunday, Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a letter to FDLE Commissioner Rick Swearingen that she was "deeply troubled" by her agency's decision to deny Scott's press conference request to investigate. on electoral fraud in both counties.

Scott did not submit any evidence to substantiate his allegations of fraud and the State Department stated that his election observers had discovered no criminal behavior. But in the middle of a fierce battle around each of the 8.3 million votes cast on Tuesday, Scott's campaign continues to weigh heavily on the electoral process in a densely populated state that could advance or defeat its lead of 12,562 votes.

"As long as the election supervisor has unguarded, unrestricted and unrestricted access to the polls, she will be able to destroy evidence of any error, accident or unlawful behavior – making it almost impossible for an aggrieved party to pursue their claims or discover later what really happened in the electoral process, "wrote attorney Jason Zimmerman in the lawsuit filed against Broward Supervisor or Elections Brenda Snipes.

Democrats, who accused Scott and Republican lawyers of suppressing voters, reacted harshly. Mark Herron, an electoral advocate who represented Al Gore in the 2000 presidential recount, described Scott's attempt to implicate the state police as an "abuse of power." Joe Geller, representative of the state of Miami and electoral advocate, described this unprecedented and unjustified request.

"I have never heard of the order of the police force to put these things in detention," said Geller, a Democrat. "It would be extraordinary."

Scott's campaigns have started a lawsuit, including a third to invalidate all ballots counted in Broward after the deadline for submission of unofficial results on Saturday, as state election departments scrambled Sunday to attempt to meet at 3 pm Thursday last deadline for recount of the votes cast during the mid-term elections of the State. Recounts were also ordered during protests for governor and agriculture commissioner because of a state law requiring an automatic recount for any election at the federal level. State decided at half a percentage point or less.

Starting Saturday, Miami-Dade employees worked 24 hours a day to complete the process. Broward and Palm Beach had difficulties. Machine problems delayed the start of Broward's recount operations until late Sunday morning. The Palm Beach Post reported that Susan Bucher, election supervisor in Palm Beach County, had warned this weekend that it would be "impossible" to meet Thursday's deadline, suggesting that her unofficial results communicated to the state Saturday would be maintained.

Intervening in the composition of the state and local police could complicate the chronology.

"In trying to seize ballots and impound voting machines, Rick Scott is doing his best to emulate the Latin American dictators who overthrew the democracies in Venezuela and Cuba," the director said Sunday night. executive of the Florida Democratic Party, Juan Peñalosa. "The governor uses his position to consolidate power by cutting the heart of our democracy."

But the missteps of Bucher and Snipes, at least, have opened the door to guaranteed skepticism.

Last week, Scott had won orders from judges in both counties after asserting in court that Bucher was improperly conducting activities involving private ballots that should have taken place before the Solicitation Committee. body responsible for overseeing the counting process and deciding. on bulletins of dubious validity.

Snipes, who has been repeatedly slapped by judges over gaffes in recent years, has been summoned by a judge to provide information about unsuccessful polls and problems after repeatedly refusing to provide information. basic information about its operations to the press or candidates.

Snipes staff also managed to mix 22 invalid provisional ballots with 183 this week, and included the votes deemed illegitimate by Broward County's poll solicitation board in its unofficial statewide vote count. . During a teleconference with reporters, Tim Cerio, an election lawyer representing Scott in South Florida, said the only reason for problematic ballots to have been discovered is that lawyers watching the solicitation asked Snipes to present him to the office.

"We are going to face those who break the law, especially those who have a history of widespread electoral fraud," said US Senator Cory Gardner, chairman of the Republican Senate campaign committee.

Recounted vote counts in South Florida could prove crucial in ongoing recounts. Once the counted votes have been submitted to the state on Thursday, all races within a quarter of 1 percent will be automatically recounted, during which the so-called "insufficient votes" and "Excessive votes" will be voted. chosen too few or too many candidates – will be considered newsletter by newsletter by solicitors.

While former Congressman Ron DeSantis has already outstripped Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum of the possibility of a manual recount in the race for governor, Scott and Nelson 's are waiting to continue fighting this weekend. Manual counting should be done by November 18th. And South Florida, a heavily democrat area of ​​the state, contains more than 35,000 ballots considered as lower votes than the vote in the Senate race. Nelson's campaign is also fighting to include rejected ballots in relation to signature asymmetries in the vote totals.

With so much focus on Broward County, protesters virtually camped outside Snipes' Lauderhill's office for three days. An angry mob cried out against Florida senator Perry Thurston and Florida Democratic Party lawyer Mitchell Berger when they appeared in a revolutionary "freedom of expression zone" designated on outdoor parking to address the media on Sunday afternoon.

"Everyone wants these votes to be counted," said Berger, claiming that hundreds of postal ballots had been intercepted at an Opa-locka messaging center and not counted due to a federal investigation into the issue. Adventurer who had sent over a dozen bombs bombed to Democrats around the state.

"False news," someone shouted. "No more democratic lies," shouted another.

Berger said he and his Republican counterpart, lawyer William Scherer, representing Scott's Senate campaign, both observed the recount process Sunday morning and decided that everything would be fine. "We both agree that there is no fraud," he said.

Eugene Pettis, a lawyer at Broward's election supervisor's office at Inside Snipes, said a hearing would be held before a judge on Monday to discuss the issue of voting and guarding the voting machine.

"They have control here," said Pettis, referring to law enforcement officers overseeing the process and election observers overseeing the process in recent weeks.

On Sunday, Scott appeared to soften his allegations of fraud after being criticized when he had asked the Florida law enforcement department to investigate Snipes and Bucher. This criticism gained momentum when the FDLE refused to investigate, claiming that it had received no official Scott application or any evidence of fraud. Election observers in Broward County also reported that they had not reported any evidence of criminal behavior.

But Republicans remain worried and Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi on Sunday wrote a letter urging the FDLE leader to investigate Snipes and Bucher.

"I am deeply troubled by our announcement that you will not pursue any investigation into documented irregularities in the conduct of election officers in Broward and Palm Beach Counties in the 2018 elections," Bondi wrote to Commissioner Rick Swearingen.

Snipes remains adamant that she has done nothing wrong and is provocative to critics. Critics also point out that Scott may have sought to remove her from her post during her eight years as governor for the litany of contentious issues raised in her recent lawsuits.

Ironically, another Broward Democrat, Sheriff Scott Israel, would have control of the ballots if Scott's campaign was successful.

Supervisors have until Thursday to submit the recount totals of the machines. Under Florida law, any manual counting must be done on November 18th. The final results must be certified on November 20th by the Florida Election Commission. The council consists of two members of the Florida Cabinet – and Governor Rick Scott.

The reporters of Glenn Garvin, Maya Kaufman and Carli Teproff of the Miami Herald contributed to this report.