Florida votes recount underway

TALLAHASSEE, Nov 11 (AP): The first election workers have begun the enormous task of recounting ballots in Florida's bitterly close races for the US Senate and governor, ramping up their efforts after the secretary of state ordered a review of the two nationally watched contests.

Miami-Dade County election officials began feeding ballots into scanning machines Saturday evening. The tedious work in that one South Florida county alone could take days, considering some 800,000 ballots were cast.

Multiply that by 67 counties in the nation's third most populous state, and the scope of the task was beginning to sink in Sunday.

The Florida secretary of state ordered the recounts Saturday, an unprecedented step for the two flagship races in a state that took five weeks to decide the 2000 presidential election.

Secretary of State Ken Detzner's office said it was unaware of any other time either a race for governor or US Senate in Florida required a recount, let alone both in the same election.

Florida's 67 counties can decide when to begin their recounts, but must complete them by Thursday. Elections officials in two large counties in the Tampa Bay area - Pinellas and Hillsborough - said they would begin recounts Sunday morning.

Unofficial results show that Republican former US Rep. Ron DeSantis led Democratic Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum by less than 0.5 percentage points, which will require a machine recount of ballots.

In the Senate race, Republican Gov. Rick Scott's lead over Democratic incumbent Bill Nelson is less than 0.25 percentage points, requiring a hand recount of ballots from tabulation machines that couldn't determine which candidate got the vote.

The recount opens against a backdrop of political tensions. President Donald Trump on Saturday tweeted without evidence that the elections were being stolen.

Angry protesters gathered at an elections office in Broward County on Saturday, waving signs and shouting with bullhorns.

Following the announcement of a recount, Gillum withdrew his concession in the governor's race.