Protests erupt over possible recounts during tight elections in Florida

Mr. Gaetz was surrounded by dozens of demonstrators with various scribbled signs in his hand. It read, "False votes do not count."

Gail Coniglio, a 52-year-old Delray Beach Republican, was standing in the pin-up crowd for Mr. DeSantis and Mr. Scott.

"It's not just Broward County, it's electoral fraud at the national level," she said. "We show the heads of government that we do not defend that. We must investigate.

Joe Duva, 67, from Tamarac, cited a court decision earlier this year that concluded that Snipes' office destroyed the ballots for a 2016 congressional race.

"I have heard a lot about the corruption at Blue Broward in 2016, when the ballots were destroyed," he said. "The responsibility goes to the top. Brenda Snipes dropped the ball here; it's still happened. "

In Palm Beach County, where the authorities were still reviewing the provisional polls, the election supervisor, Ms. Bucher, said she had felt an attempt to interfere in the process of counting votes from elected senior officials. that she attributed to the political makeup of her county, where Democrats are significantly outnumbered Republicans.

"I just felt that it is very unfortunate that some of the highest elected officials in our country are trying to disrupt our democracy because they do not like the demographics of our constituents," she said. "I wish they would allow us to continue counting votes."

She said the provisional results of the elections would be completed by Friday afternoon.

The 67 counties of Florida must submit their unofficial results to the state no later than Saturday noon. At this point, Mr. Detzner, appointed by Mr. Scott, must order accounts for the races with a margin of 0.5% or less. Three races at the state level are currently below this threshold: the race in the Senate, in which Mr. Scott leads Mr. Nelson by 0.18 percentage points; the governor's race in which Ron DeSantis, a Republican, leads to Andrew Gillum, a Democrat, of 0.44 percentage points; and the race of the agriculture commissioner, in which Nikki Fried, a Democrat, leads to Matt Caldwell, a Republican, by 0.04 percentage point.