Alabama: absentee ballots made the difference in one legislative runoff
The Mobile Press-Register reports: Almost a third of the 426 absentee ballots cast in the disputed Democratic primary runoff for Alabama House District 98 came from nine addresses, a Press-Register review of public records found.
But the executive director of an Eight Mile nursing home, which produced the most absentee votes from a single location, said the voting practices at his facility were not out of the ordinary.
Runoff winner Darren Flott said his campaign did not engage in any special push to increase his absentee ballot totals. And, he said, neither he nor his volunteers engaged in gathering illegal votes from District 98 residents.
The high number of absentee ballots are at the center of chiropractor James Gordon's accusation that illegal votes delivered Flott, a respiratory therapist, his 65-vote margin of victory in the second round of voting July 18. ...
Of 426 absentee ballots, 15.5 percent of the total turnout, Flott won 283 votes to Gordon's 143. That 140-vote advantage is more than double Flott's margin of victory. Gordon posted a 75-vote advantage among ballots actually cast on July 18 in precincts around the district. -- Arguments continue over absentee ballots