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Grancey · 06-08-2010, 09:43 PM

***UPDATE***

My fellow Alabamians came through. I may have had to disappear for a while if James had won.

Bentley secures GOP runoff spot, James raising money to pay for recount | Opelika-Auburn News

Quote:

MONTGOMERY — The tally from the Republican primary for governor shows Robert Bentley edged Tim James by 167 votes for a spot in the runoff, but James is demanding a recount.

“The people of Alabama must know the truth,” James said Tuesday.

Bentley, a Tuscaloosa physician, said he is already preparing for a runoff July 13 with first-place finisher Bradley Byrne and will reach out to James’ supporters.

“Many hard-fought campaigns are close, but there can be only one winner. I won and am in the runoff,” Bentley said.

Unofficial returns from the primary June 1 showed Bentley leading James by 208 votes, but that did not include provisional ballots.

Election officials verified and counted those ballots Tuesday, and the Alabama Republican Party announced these vote totals: Byrne 137,448 or 27.89 percent; Bentley 123,960 or 25.15 percent; and James 123,793 or 25.12 percent. Four other candidates split the remaining votes.

Under Alabama law, James must request recounts in each county and pay the cost. James said he would start with the counties with the most Republican votes and then decide whether to go statewide.

Officials in each county will determine the cost. James estimated it could be as much as $200,000, but no one knows for sure because it has never
been done.

“We are setting precedent that will be followed for generations to come,” James said.

To pay the tab, the Greenville developer began a special fundraising campaign Tuesday.

Alabama law provides for an automatic recount at the state’s expense in general elections when candidates finished within one-half percentage point, but Republican Attorney General Troy King issued an advisory opinion Tuesday saying a recount is not automatic in a primary.

King’s opinion agreed with an earlier one from the state’s chief election official, Secretary of State Beth Chapman, that the third-place finisher would have to seek a recount county by county and then pay for it.

State Republican Party Chairman Mike Hubbard said the recount will be a logistical challenge.

He and James say they want the GOP to avoid what the Democratic Party went through in 1986 with a ballot dispute. A legal battle between Democratic gubernatorial candidates Bill Baxley and Charlie Graddick caused a voter backlash and led to the election of Alabama’s first Republican governor in more than a century.

“We are not going to ever let Baxley-Graddick happen again,” James said.

He was joined at his news conference by his father, two-term Gov. Fob James, and his mother, Bobbie James. Tim James said many requests from his supporters persuaded him to seek a recount rather than conceding to Bentley.