Susan Bucher, Palm Beach County's election supervisor, has been on the go since Tuesday's election and since the state on Saturday ordered recounts in several races -- including the governor and U.S. Senate races, all too close to call.

"I have a lot of coffee," she said, smiling at the Rivera Beach tabulation center Sunday morning, where county ballots are being mechanically recounted -- an undertaking which began at 5 p.m. Saturday.

The deadline for results, ordered by Florida Secretary of State Ken Detzner, is Thursday at 3 p.m.

But that deadline, Bucher said, is very difficult to meet.

"Our equipment isn't designed to meet the deadline and we've been complaining to the state for almost 10 years and they've never extended the deadline." Bucher said. "We'll give it our best shot effort, but what we need to do is machine recount all of our ballots to find the over and under votes."

As the day progressed, the prospect of meeting the goal seemed daunting.

Bucher responded, "I don't know," when asked whether she thought they would miss the deadline.

"We are doing our very best," she added.

Bucher said there are more than 100 people working on the recount and the building is open 24/7.

If the Nov. 15 deadline is not met, Bucher said "we will send the result we sent (Saturday)."

"But we are working hard to finish by the deadline," she said.

There are several state races which are part of the recount, the two most prominent being the U.S. Senate seat and the governorship. Those races pit Florida Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican, against Democrat Bill Nelson and Republican Ron DeSantis against Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, respectively. A state senate race, two state house races and the race for state agricultural commissioner were also too close too call on Election Day.

If the recounts find any races within .25 percent, then a hand recount will follow.

There have been whispers that the recount brings back memories of the 2000 presidential election recount in Florida that lasted 37 days and, some say, made the state a national joke.

Bucher doesn't buy that argument.

"I was in the Legislature and we've re-worked some of the election laws so there is a little more uniformity," she said. "In comparison, we have control of the crowd, we have control of the activity and everything is going extremely well."

Michael Barnett, chairman of the Republican Party of Palm Beach County, was onsite and planned to stay until midnight.



“If they can’t finish the recount before the deadline, they should certify the election results, Barnett said. The votes were cast and they were counted. We can’t sit here through a three-month recount because Susan (Bucher) can’t do her job.”



He blames Bucher for the county’s outdated and faulty machines.

Citizens were also on hand to observe the process.

Leslie Keys, a 54-year-old Democrat who lives in Boynton Beach, said she's fighting for democracy.

"I voted early in person so that it would be counted," she said. "I didn't want to mail it in and was afraid of something like this."

Deloris Williams, a Democrat who resides in Riviera Beach, came to observe the process.



She says she doesn’t understand why Republicans would question the recount.

“Why is it that when they thought they had won, they had no problem with the vote?" Williams said.



During the campaign, she hung Gillum signs on her car and used a megaphone to exhort voters to do their civic duty. She soaked up the details of the complex amendments and offered tutorials to friends.



“I have always voted, but this year was especially important because the president was saying and doing all this radical stuff to stir up his base.”



Fellow Democrat Debbie Schwartz of Delray Beach said of the recount naysayers, “They’re not fair minded. Trump has taught the Republican Party to accept things without being fair minded.”

David Shiner, Palm Beach County general counsel for the Republican Party, was also present for the recount.

“We’re here to ensure that every eligible voter has a chance to have their ballot counted," he countered. "We want a fair election. We want a transparent process.”

Later in the day, Scott’s campaign stepped up its legal efforts to speed up the recount and cast a glare on election supervisors in Palm Beach and Broward counties. The Scott campaign filed three new lawsuits, one of them asking that law enforcement officials “be required to impound and secure all voting machines, tallying devices and ballots when they are not in use until the conclusion of the recount.”

That suit specifically requests the sheriffs’ offices in Palm Beach County and Broward, as well as the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, step in to secure the ballots. Scott’s campaign charged the Broward County elections supervisor Brenda Snipes has a “history of breaking the law by destroying ballots.” Regarding Palm Beach County elections supervisor Susan Bucher, the Scott campaign cited a “failure to follow legal requirements for reviewing ballots.”

Nelson issued a statement calling Scott’s new wave of legal motions an attempt to “stop every legal vote” from being tallied. “He’s doing this for the same reason he’s been making false and panicked claims about voter fraud -- he’s worried that when all the votes are counted he’ll lose this election,” said Nelson, who vowed to “use every legal tool available to protect the rights of Florida voters.”

In a separate lawsuit, the Scott campaign is requesting that Broward County votes tallied by the local canvassing board after an imposed deadline be tossed out. The suit alleges that supervisor Snipes counted a number of ballots after the Saturday noon deadline.

As the recount unfolded, Republicans urged their Democratic opponents to give up and allow the state to move on. Scott said Sunday that Nelson wants fraudulent ballots and those cast by noncitizens to count, pointing to a Nelson lawyer objecting to Palm Beach County's rejection of one provisional ballot because it was cast by a noncitizen.

"He is trying to commit fraud to win this election," Scott told Fox News. "Bill Nelson's a sore loser. He's been in politics way too long."

Nelson's campaign issued a statement Sunday saying their lawyer wasn't authorized to object to the ballot's rejection as "Non-citizens cannot vote in US elections."

Gillum and Nelson have argued each vote should be counted and the process allowed to take its course.

Heading into the recount, results submitted to the state Saturday from all 67 counties showed significant Democratic gains since Tuesday’s unofficial tallies.

Scott’s lead over incumbent Nelson dwindled to 12,562 in the final count. As of Saturday, Scott led Nelson 50.7 to 49.9 percent.

DeSantis also saw his margin for victory narrow to 33,684 votes against Gillum. As of Saturday, DeSantis led Gillum 49.59 to 49.18 percent.

After trailing Republican Matt Caldwell after Tuesday’s vote for agriculture commissioner, Democrat Nikki Fried now leads him by a mere 5,326 votes.

In House District 89, which encompasses the city of Boca Raton to Palm Beach Shores, a recount was ordered in race between Republican Mike Caruso and Democrat Jim Bonfiglio. Caruso led as of Saturday’s total by 37 votes.

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Associated Press contributed to this report.

kthompson@pbpost.com

@KevinDThompson1



lbalmaseda@pbpost.com

@LizBalmaseda