By Greg Grisolano
ggrisolano@joplinglobe.com
GIRARD, Kan. — Still down by 14 votes after a second recount, the incumbent Crawford County attorney said Wednesday that he plans to file a request today for a hand recount of all ballots.
“I’ve got nine employees and a lot of voters who don’t have a lot of confidence in the machines,” said John Gutierrez, Crawford County attorney. “When you’re losing by 0.089 percent of the vote, you want to make sure that the count was correct.”
The County Commission, meeting as the election board, accepted the results of a second recount at a meeting Wednesday at the courthouse in Girard. Republican challenger Michael Gayoso Jr. received 7,810 votes to 7,796 votes for Gutierrez, according to numbers certified by the election board.
Those numbers included 31 provisional ballots cast by members of the military. County Clerk Don Pyle said 28 of those ballots carried votes in the county attorney race, and the candidates split them 14 apiece.
After the Nov. 4 election, the unofficial tally showed a 70-vote spread between the two, with Gayoso the leader. That margin was trimmed to 60 votes, and then a recount Tuesday cut the difference to 14 votes, with the tallies ahead of Wednesday’s recount being 7,782 votes for Gutierrez and 7,796 for Gayoso.
Pyle said he was not surprised by a possible new recount.
“When you look at the percentages, there’s not even a full tenth of a percent in the difference of the vote,” Pyle said Wednesday.
Gayoso said he had not thought the race would be as close as it turned out.
“Obviously people were extremely polarized either way,” he said. “There’s no question I couldn’t have won if it hadn’t been for a bipartisan movement between Democrat and Republican voters.”
Gutierrez must post a bond to cover the cost of a new recount, and Crawford County Democratic Party officials said Wednesday that they have offered to put up a portion of the bond.
“It’s John’s decision to make,” said Beth Bradrick, party chairwoman. “If he chooses to go ahead and do it, we will help subsidize the bond.”
Pyle said another option that could come into play is that Democrats could challenge about 250 provisional ballots that were disqualified, in an effort to draw more votes.
Any challenge to provisional ballots would have to be filed in district court.
Bradrick said she had no knowledge of any plans at this point to challenge the provisional ballots.
Recount bond
Democrat John Gutierrez must post a bond of about $3,500 to cover the county’s expenses for doing another recount. He has until 5 p.m. today to file a request for a recount.
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