Election officials have now started recounting votes by hand in Georgia following President Donald Trump’s election fraud allegations.
President-elect Joe Biden has a lead of about 14,000 votes, but almost 5 million ballots are due to be checked. Donald Trump has made unsubstantiated claims of widespread fraud or irregularities in the state.
Counties have until next Wednesday to finish the recount. All counties are being told to certify their results by the end of this Friday – and if the recount result is different they will need to certify them again, the Washington Post reported.
State election official Gabriel Sterling told the newspaper it was the “largest hand retallying by an audit in the history of the United States”.
The state is due to certify its full results next Friday.
But there’s a separate recount that could also be triggered later this month.
Under state law, the losing candidate can call a recount if the margin is less than 0.5% of votes cast. Biden’s victory at the moment is at 0.3%
The recount is unlikely to produce a different result, as they typically swing no more than a few hundred votes either way.
