# Recount A **recount** is a second official tally of the ballots in a race close enough to trigger one. It comes in two forms: - **Automatic (mandatory).** The margin falls inside a threshold set by state law, and the state orders the recount, usually at public expense. The most common trigger is **0.5%**. - **Requested.** A candidate asks for one, usually paying for it, often through a bond that is refunded only if the result changes. A recount is a **counting** procedure. It is different from an **election contest**, which is a lawsuit that can raise eligibility, procedural violations or fraud. In a few states (Illinois, Mississippi, Tennessee) a result can only be changed through litigation. ## The state rules Sources disagree on the count: - **Ballotpedia** lists 28 states with automatic recounts and 43 that allow requested ones; Arizona and Florida allow no requested recounts. The person asking pays in 23 states, and the state pays in 7. Mississippi and Tennessee have no recount provision at all. - **MultiState** counts 20 states with margin-triggered recounts. [[Recount Trigger Crosswalk]] reconciles these three sources and explains why they cannot agree: there are **three tiers, not two**, and the middle one — the loser must ask, the state must grant, the public pays — is counted as automatic by some trackers and as requested by others. That map also resolves the Michigan question below: the statute, Mich. Comp. Laws § 168.880a(1), gives the trigger as **0.1% of the total votes cast**, so the 2,000-vote figure is a stale rendering. Thresholds differ in kind as well as size. Arizona recounts automatically at 0.5% or less. Wisconsin's recount is free to the requester at 0.25% or less. Michigan's trigger is given as a percentage by one source and a fixed vote count by another. ## What recounts change: very little FairVote studied **6,929 statewide general elections from 2000 to 2023**: - **36** went to a recount (23 automatic, 13 requested). - **3** were reversed: Washington governor 2004, Vermont auditor 2006 and Minnesota Senate 2008. That is one reversal per 2,310 elections. - The average margin shift was **551 votes (0.03%)**, and every reversal came at an original margin of 0.06% or less. That is the practical answer to "stop the count" and "find the votes" politics: a recount corrects small errors. It does not uncover hidden thousands. ## The landmark cases | Race | What happened | |---|---| | Florida 2000 | Bush was certified ahead by 537 votes. *[[Bush v. Gore]]* (Dec 12, 2000) found an equal-protection problem 7–2 and, 5–4, held that no recount could be finished in time. | | Washington governor 2004 | Christine Gregoire overturned a 261-vote deficit and won by 129. | | Minnesota Senate 2008 | Al Franken overturned [[Norm Coleman]]'s 206-vote election-night lead and won by 312. | | Wisconsin 2020 | Trump paid $3 million for recounts in Milwaukee and Dane counties. Biden *gained* a net 87 votes. | | Georgia 2020 | A full hand count, run as a [[Risk-Limiting Audit]], found a few thousand uncounted ballots in four counties. Biden stayed about 12,000 ahead, and a machine recount Trump requested ended with recertification on Dec 7. | | Pennsylvania Senate 2024 | Dave McCormick led Bob Casey by about 16,000 votes (0.24%), inside the state's 0.5% trigger. The recount, costing an estimated $1 million or more, was stopped on Nov 22 after Casey conceded. | ## 2026 - **Indiana Senate District 23 (GOP primary).** Incumbent Deery led Trump-endorsed challenger Paula Copenhaver by three votes. The state Recount Commission threw out ballots that lacked a clerk's signature, which flipped the race to Copenhaver by three. On **September 10, 2026**, the Indiana Supreme Court restored those ballots and declared Deery the winner, 6,335–6,332. It is the year's clearest case of a recount turning on which ballots count, not on how they are counted. - **Florida's 11th District (GOP primary).** A 393-vote margin (about 0.48%) triggered a machine recount in August. Each candidate gained one vote. ## See Also - [[Election Canvass]] · [[Election Certification]] · [[How a Midterm Election Is Certified]] - [[How a Ballot Is Counted]] · [[How Election Results Are Transmitted and Reported]] · [[Election Ballot Chain of Custody Flow]] - [[Recount Trigger Crosswalk]] · [[Post-Election Audit Crosswalk]] - [[Risk-Limiting Audit]] · [[Bush v. Gore]] · [[2020 Presidential Election]]