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Pennsylvania’s acting secretary of state declared Wednesday that the state will conduct a recount of the ballots cast in the tight race between Dr. Mehmet Oz and hedge fund CEO David McCormick.
Over a week after Pennsylvania voters cast their ballots in the Republican primary election, Acting Secretary of State Leigh Chapman announced that the razor-thin margin between Oz and McCormick triggered a recount under Pennsylvania law.
According to The Hill, official vote tallies as of Wednesday afternoon show that McCormick and Oz are separated by only 902 votes, which is less than a tenth of a percentage point. Pennsylvania state law says an automatic recount is triggered if any two candidates are separated by 0.5 percent of the vote.
CNBC reported that Pennsylvania counties have until June 1 to begin recounting ballots for the GOP Senate race and must complete their recounts by June 7.
President Trump recently weighed in on the process of Pennsylvania’s primary elections, saying, “Pennsylvania’s ‘count’ could be a long time in coming. It is all screwed up.” The 45th president also warned, “Mail-In Ballots are a disaster for America. Allows large scale, systematic cheating.”
McCormick’s campaign has filed a lawsuit in an attempt to allow undated absentee ballots to be counted. Absentee ballots have favored McCormick, while those cast on election day have favored Oz. The Republican National Committee became involved earlier this week to prevent undated ballots from being counted.
RNC chief counsel Matt Raymer explained, “The RNC is intervening in this lawsuit alongside the Pennsylvania GOP because election laws are meant to be followed, and changing the rules when ballots are already being counted harms the integrity of our elections.”
The Pennsylvania Senate recount will inevitably delay the GOP from uniting for one candidate who will face off against Democrat candidate Lt. Gov. John Fetterman. As Trump pointed out on Truth Social, counting ballots in elections “should never take so long.”
