The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Recount due before December 13
[ By Mark Reaman ]
Given the extremely tight vote between congressional candidates Lauren Boebert and Adam Frisch, a recount is expected to be mandated by the Colorado Secretary of State and Gunnison County will take part.
County clerk Kathy Simillion said her office was set to complete the formal vote count process this week by completing the required Risk Limited Audit of the local votes followed by the local political parties signing off on the tally.
Since the Boebert-Frisch race ended up with a difference of less than 0.17% in the 3rd Congressional District that includes Gunnison County with just 554 votes out of more than 327,000 votes cast separating the two, Colorado state statute requires a recount. In Colorado, a mandatory recount is triggered when the margin of votes between the top two candidates is at or below 0.5%.
“Colorado will not conduct a hand recount so we will run the ballots back through the tabulator,” explained Simillion. “Both political parties will have representatives and possibly send watchers. The process should take no more than two days.”
Simillion said Republican candidate for Secretary of State Tina Peters paid for a recount during the primary election and so the county recently conducted a recount. She emphasized that in such situations the recount doesn’t change many, if any votes.
“The counting tabulators are very accurate,” she emphasized. “The timeline is that it must be completed by December 13. So we will be scheduling this very soon after consulting with the Secretary of State Office.”
In Gunnison County, Frisch unofficially beat Boebert 6,219 to her 2,760 votes.
