The NBC 6 Investigators got an exclusive look at what went wrong during the last midterm election in Broward and other counties across the state after obtaining post-election reports.
Each county in Florida is required to fill out a report after the midterm elections. Broward County is the only county in the state that had an additional three-page report attached to the back of its submission. It’s a report that was written by the two judges that were sitting on the county’s canvassing board, and it was critical of the former Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes and her staff.
In the report to the State, the judges claimed Snipes and her workers were “not prepared,” that “staffing shortages delayed” the process and caused them to miss crucial deadlines and that her office made “… procedural violations.”
Broward County missed the first recount deadline by two minutes and misplaced more than 2,000 ballots. The NBC 6 Investigators first reported those developments last month.
But the judges in the report also claim election workers opened 205 provisional ballots and matched the signatures to verify the votes before taking them to the canvassing board.
It’s a much more critical report than other counties that also had problems.
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In Palm Beach, where machines overheated and crucial deadlines were missed, the county’s report only states they had a “mechanical failure.”
In Hillsborough County, there’s no mention of a recount in the report. It states “poll workers failed to follow procedures to modem results,” as one of the problems reported.
Governor Rick Scott removed Snipes from office. She’s now suing to get her job back.
Snipes’s attorney, Burnadette Norris-Weeks, said over the phone her client is fighting for fairness and for her reputation as a longtime public servant. Her attorney also said the report can be misleading because it’s from the viewpoint of those who wrote it and Dr. Snipes chose not to sign it. She went on to say all of the reports from each county are self -reported and not fact-checked by the State.
