Two days before the state’s top election official must decide on a recount in the U.S. Senate race, more than 88,000 ballots remained uncounted Tuesday.
The Associated Press declared Republican Dave McCormick defeated U.S. Sen. Bob Casey last week, but Casey again refused to concede Tuesday and pleaded for patience as a legal battle and counting continued.
“Across our Commonwealth, close to 7 million people cast their votes in a free and fair election,” Casey said in a video posted on X. “Our county election officials will finish counting those votes, just like they do in every election. The American democratic process was born in Pennsylvania and that process will play out. “
He thanked election staffers statewide for working diligently over the weekend to “ensure Pennsylvanians’ voices are heard.”
His campaign declined to make him available for an interview.
Casey was in Washington, D.C., for votes Tuesday. McCormick was in the capital, too, but for Senate orientation. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer at first declined to invite McCormick to the orientation, but yielded to pressure from colleagues, The Hill, which covers Capitol Hill, reported. On X, the National Republican Senatorial Committee posted a photo of McCormick holding a sign proclaiming him senator-elect.
His campaign declined further comment.
County boards of elections had until 5 p.m. Tuesday to submit unofficial election returns to state Secretary of State Al Schmidt.
Schmidt will use the returns to determine whether to order a recount.
If the gap between McCormick and Casey is a half-percentage point or smaller, Schmidt must order a recount by 5 p.m. Thursday, according to a Department of State directive.
As of 5 p.m. Tuesday, McCormick had 3,377,664 votes, or 48.93%, Casey, 3,348,133, 48.5%.
That 29,531-vote difference represents 0.43 percentage points, small enough to trigger an automatic recount.
The counties are allowed to update their unofficial returns until Thursday at 5 p.m., according to the directive.
The unofficial returns must include an accurate accounting of uncounted provisional, mail-in, absentee and other alternative ballots, including from military and overseas voters.
If Schmidt orders a recount, it must start no later than Nov. 20 and be completed by noon on Nov. 26.
Recounts generally don’t alter outcomes often but the future of tens of thousands of ballots remained undetermined Tuesday.
DecisionDeskHQ, an arm of The Hill, reported 88,235 provisional, mail-in, overseas and military ballots still uncounted as of 5 p.m. Tuesday.
That broke down like this: 66,176 provisionals, 8,684 mail-ins and 13,375 overseas and military.
On Friday, the McCormick campaign sued the Philadelphia County Board of Elections to gain the right to automatically challenge all provisional ballots cast there that share a defect that makes them illegal to count.
The campaign also wants the court to order the board to keep separate “all provisional ballots cast by voters who had previously requested mail-in or absentee ballots until” the U.S. Supreme Court rules.
The McCormick campaign has estimated between 15,000 and 20,000 provisional ballots exist in Philadelphia alone.
