HARRISBURG, Pa. — Several Pennsylvania counties, including Lancaster, began recounting ballots in Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate race on Monday.
The remaining counties must start before Wednesday.
"The counties don’t use the original machines that the votes were counted on," said Dr. Dan Mallinson, associate professor of public policy and administration at Penn State Harrisburg. "They have to either count the votes by hand or they have to run them in a different machine."
It comes as the margin between the two candidates shrinks, with about 17,000 ballots separating Republican Dave McCormick and Incumbent Democratic Senator Bob Casey on Tuesday.
The Associated Press called the race for McCormick days after the election.
Both sides have gone to the courts as the contest draws to a close.
On Monday, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ordered counties not to count mail-in ballots without a proper date after several Democrat-led counties did so.
The court reaffirmed its earlier decision, keeping potentially thousands of undated or misdated ballots out of the final tally.
It’s seen as a win for the McCormick campaign as more Democrats voted by mail than did Republicans.
Mallinson said it may not change the final result.
"It’s unlikely to swing the race. It’s also unlikely for a recount to swing the race," he said. "Right now, the margin is about 0.43%. Very rarely will these recounts result in a different outcome. That usually only happens if the margin is extremely close."
The campaigns have also gone to the courts about whether some provisional ballots should count.
Questions have been posed to courts in several key counties about election workers not signing ballot envelopes, voters not signing provisional ballots twice or not indicating their reasons for casting provisional ballots.
"If the margin was much wider, I would imagine that the Casey campaign would drop these suits, but given that it’s this close, they’re sort of fighting it out about every valid ballot," Mallinson said.
Counties must finish their recount by next Tuesday, Nov. 26, and report the results to Secretary of the Commonwealth Al Schmidt the following day.