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Saturday Morning News

Hand Counts, Court Actions Continue in Florida

Aired November 18, 2000 - 9:00 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

KYRA PHILLIPS, ANCHOR: We'll report the results of those manual recounts as soon as they become available. And we have CNN reporters posted at those various points in this developing story.

And for an overview, we're going to turn to CNN's ringmaster of this legal and political show of shows, Bill Hemmer, still at the state capital of Tallahassee.

Hi, Bill.

MILES O'BRIEN, ANCHOR: Morning, Bill.

BILL HEMMER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Kyra, Miles, good morning to both of you.

We're all going to get our law degrees before this thing is finally finished.

A lot to talk about in the coming hour here on CNN. First, though, I want to update you at the federal level. The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta yesterday dismissed a motion filed by the Bush campaign to try and get those hand recounts in certain parts of Florida stopped.

However, Republicans contend they may be able to resume that fight at the federal level at some pint in the -- point, rather, in the very near future.

Again, a lot to talk about, a lot of courtroom activity this morning.

First stop for us this hour, the Florida state supreme court, where CNN's Mike Boettcher waiting about five hours from now for those legal briefs to be filed.

Mike, good morning to you.

MIKE BOETTCHER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning, Bill.

The state supreme court in Florida said it wanted to maintain the status quo, and that is exactly what it has done. The secretary of state has had to put off the final certification ceremony and the hand counts can go on in the various counties. Secretary of state -- former secretary of state James Baker, who is the top Bush man here, said he was disappointed but believes that the Republican arguments will eventually prevail.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES BAKER, BUSH CAMPAIGN OBSERVER: We remain confident that for all of the reasons discussed by the trial court in its two opinions, the supre court will find that the secretary of state properly exercised her discretion and followed the law.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOETTCHER: Attorneys for both sides were up late into the night preparing their briefs, which are due at 2:00 today. These are written arguments. One of those attorneys was for the Democrats, Ron Klain.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RON KLAIN, SENIOR GORE ADVISER: Her position that she doesn't have to consider the hand counts at all, we think, is contrary to the spirit of Florida law and contrary to the decision by Judge Lewis earlier this week that said that she should look at the hand counts before she makes a decision whether or not to accept them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOETTCHER: The Florida supreme court has a reputation for making independent decisions. It is selected by a judicial nominating commission when new openings come up. And every six years, they are put on what is called a merit ballot, Did this person do a good job? So they don't have to run against someone, raise money. They're considered a pretty apolitical court, and people around the country have a lot of respect for this court.

And at the end of the day, there's a big football game, so I imagine the court will wrap up. We know some of the justices will be there. And in terms, Bill, of that contest coming up, I have only one thing to say -- go, Sooners!

HEMMER: Oklahoma roots, Mike.

Before we let you go, though, the American public on Monday is going to get a real opportunity to see the legal system at work. In the state supreme court in Florida, it is an open book when it comes to watching the legal proceedings. Maybe you could tell -- talk a little more about that on Monday afternoon now.

BOETTCHER: Well, they don't call it the Sunshine State for nothing, because they have sunshine laws here. We have cameras in the courtroom, and there are four set cameras in that supreme court. There was a satellite uplink they have permanently there. And these proceedings will be seen, these oral arguments.

It's a spectacular thing, really, to be able to see a supreme court live in such a weighty, important case. It will be a marvel for people to watch, and people around the country, I hope, do, because it will be an amazing thing.

HEMMER: All right, Mike Boettcher, the state supreme court. Mike, thanks to you.

I want to take you now to central Florida and CNN's Mark Potter, who's watching another court case there, this one involving absentee ballots.

Mark, good morning to you.

MARK POTTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Bill.

We'll have a camera in this courtroom as well. About a half hour from now in the courthouse behind me, there will be a hearing in circuit court on a lawsuit filed by an attorney who's also active in Democratic Party politics.

What he's trying to do is get thousands of Republican absentee ballots, votes that have already been counted, thrown out because of alleged violations of the Florida election law.

Now, according to this lawsuit filed by Harry Jacobs, here allegedly is what happened. Before the election, the GOP sent out applications for absentee ballots, trying to get the vote out. They sent them to Republicans. The ballots came -- the applications came back into the elections office, where officials noted that on the form, the registration numbers, the voter registration numbers as required by Florida law, were missing. It was a misprint.

The supervisor of elections said she could not accept those applications. Now, according to the lawsuit, what happened next was that the supervisor allowed Republican officials to come to the elections office to put the numbers on the applications so that they would conform with state law. The ballots then went out, the votes were cast, they came back, and they were counted.

The Democrats claim that that alteration of the application was a violation of state law, a felony, and they say that the proper remedy is for those absentee ballots to be thrown out. And if they cannot be found now, if they're mixed in with all the other absentee ballots, then all of them must be thrown out, and that would represent 15,000 absentee ballots, 10,000 of which went for George Bush, 5,000 for Al Gore.

And, of course, that would make a major difference in this election if that were allowed to occur.

The Republicans strongly deny any wrongdoing. They say that this involved an application, it was not the ballot itself. They say the Democrats are simply trying to win the election. They criticize them for that and they predict that no judge is going to throw these ballots out.

But we'll see what happens. The hearing is coming up shortly. Bill, back to you.

HEMMER: All right, Mark. Mark Potter live in Sanford, Florida.

Want to also bring you up to date now on Miami-Dade in southeastern Florida. They are inching closer and closer toward starting a manual recount in that part of Florida. In fact, there's a meeting this morning, this Saturday morning, to talk more about that, and we should find out shortly about how Miami-Dade plans on proceeding in the current matter.

Also in southeastern Florida, Palm Beach County, where CNN's John Zarrella, he's been holding down the post there for well over a week now. John, they are counting once again there. Good morning to you.

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Bill.

That's correct, they have started again, 24 teams, we are told. They say they were short three Republicans this morning, but as soon as they show up, they'll add them to the mix, and fill out Democrat- Republican-Democrat-Republican as they get some more teams going.

They've counted about 46,000 ballots, about 88 precincts in all have been counted. But we do not have that raw number yet. They have not come out with a raw number for the gain for one candidate or the other. That's because of the questionable ballots from each of those precincts. They can't sign off on a precinct being completed and recounted until they've handled all of the questionable ballots, the ones with the fallen chads and et cetera.

So until that happens, we won't have a complete look, a complete picture of any gains or losses for the candidates.

And that has been a frustration. Judge Charles Burton this morning before he started was talking about -- talking to the people about how there are just too many ballots that are being marked as questionable but probably don't need to be.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JUDGE CHARLES BURTON, PALM BEACH COUNTY CANVASSING BOARD: If it's clearly a vote, it's clearly a vote. We ought not to be playing games by either party. We will all be here till Christmas if this continues. We have one ballot with 414 questionables. And I guarantee you, when we get through with those, I will hear about four objections from the lawyers. So we're sitting here wasting our time going through all these objectionables.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZARRELLA: I have a feeling that we're -- may not be here till Christmas, but we're definitely going to be here through Thanksgiving. They're telling us now that although they thought it might take just five days to wrap this up, Bill, that with all of what's been going on inside and the difficulty in getting this thing moving every day, that Tuesday, which is what they thought might be a good day to wrap it up, is looking a lot -- very, very much optimistic to get done by Tuesday.

So it may drag on beyond that. Bill?

HEMMER: Happy Turkey Day. John Zarrella in West Palm this morning. John, thanks.

Let's keep it moving now. CNN's Susan Candiotti's standing by now in Broward County this morning. Susan is back in Plantation, Florida, with us now.

Susan, they're counting again there. What's the latest?

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, they haven't started just yet. It always takes a while to get organized in the morning. And so the ballot counters and observers started coming into this building more or less about an hour ago, and they are still getting organized and waiting for word to start.

There are 70 teams of people here in all, two ballot counters on each team as well as one Republican and one Democrat. Some of these people are from the area, others are party loyalists who flew in from as far away as Texas, New York, Illinois, and Oklahoma. They said that they knew help was needed and they wanted to be a part of history.

Now, in the room in which they are working -- this building is called the emergency operations center, and normally official personnel work on hurricanes and other disasters, normally that's what this building is used for -- so the room is set up with big-screen TV, so as people are waiting for the work to resume, they can certainly look up and watch to see what's going on, look at the headlines. The volume, however, is turned down, so they can pay attention to the work that they are doing.

The three members of the canvassing board are not all here, only one is here, but they are expected to arrive within the hour. They are here to certify the counts and to go over contested ballots. I believe once they're in place, probably the rest of these people will be able to begin their work.

Last night, the canvassing board counted overseas ballots and came up with 53 additional votes for Vice President Gore and 37 for Governor Bush.

So far, in regards to the hand recount, they have gone over a little more than 20 percent of the precincts in this county and have counted up a 38 additional votes for Vice President Gore.

They still believe that they can wrap up their work here by Monday at 5:00. When we asked them if they still think they'll be on track on that schedule, they said, Well, let's revisit that again tomorrow.

That's it from here, Bill. Back to you.

HEMMER: All right, Susan. Susan Candiotti in Plantation, Florida.

Again, the headlines, for the moment anyway, 927 the margin of difference between George W. Bush and Al Gore, with 66 of 67 counties reporting at this time. We expect that number to change shortly, though, with Jackson County set to report here to Tallahassee coming up later this morning.

Also, 2:00 p.m. local time, five hours away, for the legal briefs to be filed in state supreme court here in Florida.

Doug Hattaway, Gore spokesperson, will be our guest shortly here on CNN SATURDAY MORNING.

But for now, back to Atlanta and more now with Miles -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: All right, thank you, Bill. Checking in with you in just a bit.

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