The latest absentee ballot totals from the NY-23 special election show Democratic Rep. Bill Owens leading his Conservative Party opponent Doug Hoffman –Â with a greater margin than there are absentee ballots left to be counted.
The Watertown Daily Times reports that Owens leads by 3,105 votes, with 3,072 ballots left to count. It is mathematically impossible for Hoffman to win.
Owens was sworn in two weeks ago, after Hoffman had conceded the election. The correction of routine clerical errors, however, narrowed Owens’ margin from 5,000 votes to about 3,000, leading Hoffman to take back his concession.
Last night, Hoffman charged that the election was stolen: “ACORN, the unions and Democratic Party were scared, and that’s why they tampered with the ballots of voters in NY-23.”
Late Update: Hoffman spokesman Rob Ryan declined to comment specifically on these numbers, as he had not yet seen them in the figures that he gets from the county boards of elections. “We have found certain irregularities,” said Ryan. “And when the count is completed, and we take a look — and we have until Monday to decide whether to file those objections — we are going to make a decision between now and then on whether and how to proceed.”
