Having conducted recounts in New Hampshire for decades for Republican candidates, I wanted to share my thoughts on the different terms for contesting elections and how they play out in a recount.

The current major controversy nationally is the challenge by President Trump to former Vice President Joe Biden’s win in Pennsylvania by about 50,000 votes out of millions cast.

Only when a vote count is much closer is a recount even warranted. In New Hampshire when the U.S. Senate contest between Kelly Ayotte and Maggie Hassan resulted in a spread of 1,017 votes out of 738,000 votes cast in 2016, a recount would seem like a good idea. Yet Kelly and I decided not to proceed because it is hard to flip that number with counting errors in this state. If the spread were 117 votes it would have been different, but to make up 1,017 votes through errors is not realistic because our votes are very accurately tallied.

Yes, errors can occur, but the difference between fraud and irregularities was well explained in a case out of Ward 6 in Manchester in 1994. Donna Soucy (now President of the Senate) was running for alderman then. After she was declared the winner a complaint was submitted to the state Ballot Law Commission with a number of allegations. One was that 36 names were crossed off the checklist as having voted absentee, yet the absentee voter list showed their ballots were not received. While 202 absentee ballots were received, the tally only reported 191 votes. It was also alleged they weren’t counted in public.

These and other irregularities caused the Ballot Law Commission to order a new election even though it found no fraud. Donna Soucy appealed to the New Hampshire Supreme Court which clarified the law that prevails in most of the country today.

First, to set aside an election a losing candidate must either prove fraud which leaves the intent of the voters in doubt or prove irregularities in the conduct of the election of such a nature as to have affected the outcome. Fraud is only proven by a higher burden of clear and convincing evidence, so it is very hard to prove. On the other hand, “in the absence of fraud, illegal votes caused by accident or mistake which do not change the outcome will not invalidate an election” said our high court.

The bottom line was that because Donna Soucy won by 303 votes, even if all 202 absentee votes were given to her opponent, she still would have won by 101 votes.

Because there are 3,007 counties in this country plus thousands of towns, cities and wards there will be mistakes, and even some chicanery, that in a very close election could be pivotal. Tens of thousands of poll watchers, counters and ballot processors do their best to count every vote and keep our elections from the kind of fraud countries like Belarus or Nicaragua experience.

An affidavit saying someone told me they saw someone else put 10 ballots in the trash is very far from clear and convincing evidence to prove fraud. It is mere hearsay. To malign our free elections with such charges is a waste of everyone’s time and energy. Minor anecdotes like that, even if true, will not change an election result like Pennsylvania’s 50,000 vote margin.

The genius of our Founders placing the states in charge of federal elections is that a national fraud is impossible to pull off. We all need to exhale and wait for the process to play out this year. Without solid evidence of fraud real lawyers know they are just getting paid for nothing.

Chuck Douglas is a former State Supreme Court Justice and Republican Congressman who lives in Bow.

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