Jill Stein Fundraising To Launch A Recount Of Votes In 3 Key States
CHICAGO (CBS) – There is a new effort that could dump President-elect Trump before he takes office.
Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein is launching a recount effort in three key states.
And if successful, it could flip the election. CBS 2's political reporter Derrick Blakely reports.
Green Party candidate Jill Stein is questioning the election results that put Donald Trump in the White House.
"The reason we are doing this is we do not have confidence in the election results themselves," said David Cobb, Stein's campaign manager. "Cyber experts have shown us it is possible to hack these systems."
The Green Party is launching a fundraising drive to hold a recount in three states, Pennsylvania with 20 electoral votes, Wisconsin with 10, and Michigan with 16. That is a total of 46 electoral votes.
Voters gave Trump 306 electoral votes and Clinton 232, but if Stein's recount found enough votes in all 3, the new total would be Clinton with 278, and Trump with 260.
The process will cost some money.
"Yes, we have to pay for the recounts," Cobb said. "$1.1 million in Wisconsin, $600,000 in Michigan, $500,000 in Pennsylvania."
But the deadlines for filing recounts is tight. The question now is whether the Green Party can convert the street protests over the election results into cold cash.
"We are filing these recounts in an effort to determine if we ca be confident in the reported election results," Cobb said.
Stein, who grew up in Highland Park campaigned in Chicago's Austin neighborhood last summer. She drew 1.3 million votes nationwide, so the recount is not about changing her election fortunes.
Computer experts reportedly first urged the Clinton campaign to launch a recount, saying there is a questionable trend of her performing worse in counties that relied on electronic voting than those that used paper ballots or optical scanners.
Trump won those three key states by fairly close margins: Michigan by less than 10,000 votes, Wisconsin by less than 30,000 votes and Pennsylvania by less than 70,000 votes.
