Iowa Democrats will recount more than 20 caucus precincts
February 21, 2020
The Iowa state Democratic Party announced Friday it accepted a limited recount request from the two top candidates in this month’s caucuses: Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders.
An unsigned statement from the state party said it will recount 10 precincts requested by the Sanders campaign and 14 by the Buttigieg campaign, for a total of 23 unique precincts.
The party accepted the entirety of Sanders’ recount request, according to data it released earlier this week. However, the party did not accept the Buttigieg campaign’s entire request. His campaign requested a recount in 54 precincts, but just 14 were accepted.
It was not clear which precincts are being recounted — the state party did not release a list of accepted precincts — or the reason most of Buttigieg’s requested precincts were rejected. A spokesperson for the state party did not immediately respond to a request for more information.
The state party said it “transmitted to the campaigns further details on costs associated with the recount and the timeline going forward,” and that the two campaigns have 24 hours to respond “with financial information to proceed with the request.”
The recount is expected to start Tuesday and last for two days.
Prior to the recount, results from the state party after a recanvass showed Buttigieg with a very slim lead over Sanders in state delegate equivalents, 563.2 to 563.1, or a difference of about 0.004 percentage points. The Associated Press has not declared a winner in the first-in-the-nation caucuses, which were held on Feb. 3.
Source: https://www.politico.com/
