The Department of Homeland Security has said it saw no evidence of vote hacking on Election Day. | Getty Citing ‘reported hacks,’ Jill Stein says she’ll file for recounts in three states

Jill Stein’s presidential campaign announced Wednesday that it plans to file for recounts in three key states if it can raise enough money.

“After a divisive and painful presidential race,” the Green Party candidate said in a statement, “reported hacks into voter and party databases and individual email accounts are causing many Americans to wonder if our election results are reliable.”


Stein wants to request recounts in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania — states that were critical to President-elect Donald Trump's victory. The GOP candidate carried Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, and is likely to win Michigan, although the state has not yet been officially called.

A Stein spokeswoman said the campaign has not yet filed the official paperwork for the recounts. The campaign needs $2 million to pay for the filing fees and the actual recount process, and it has set up a fundraising website to collect the money. As of Thursday morning, the campaign had raised $2.5 million, according to multiple news reports.

The deadlines to file for a recount are Friday in Wisconsin, Monday in Pennsylvania and Wednesday in Michigan.

The subject of recounts in these states first arose late Tuesday when New York Magazine reported that election security experts were urging Hillary Clinton’s campaign to contest the results there, citing suspicious results.

One of those experts, University of Michigan professor J. Alex Halderman, subsequently clarified that he did not have evidence suggesting that the election had been hacked. But he nonetheless recommended that the key states undertake a full audit — a procedure separate from a recount in which the voting technology itself is tested.

The FBI confirmed during the campaign that hackers had penetrated two states’ voter registration systems. But when the Obama administration blamed Russia for election-season cyberattacks, it said it could not declare with confidence that Russia had been behind the voter-database hacks.

The Department of Homeland Security has said it saw no evidence of vote hacking on Election Day.

CORRECTION: A previous version of this article misstated the timeline for the filing. Stein's campaign plans to file for recounts if it can raise enough money.