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From: eLeader@mail.echampions2000.com Sent: Wednesday, November 29, 2000 2:07 AM To: fhoot@aol.com Subject: Truth Versus Gore Dear eChampion, Please review the following fact sheet and quotes, and forward to family, friends, and associates. It is time for truth to prevail and for Gore to concede. Thank you, Jim Nicholson Chairman, RNC **************************************************************** SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT MYTH: There are more than 10,000 votes in Miami-Dade that have never been counted. David Boies: "[T]here are over 10,000 ballots that have never been counted once for the presidency of the United States." [Today Show, 11/27/00] FACT: * Every ballot in Miami-Dade was counted at least twice - once on election night and again during the automatic recount. * In every election, there are a significant number of ballots that are cast by voters without choosing a candidate in every race on the ballot, including races for President. For example, in this election, 5% of the voters in Idaho, 3.9% of the voters in Illinois and 3.6% of the voters in Wyoming cast a ballot without registering a vote for President. * The 10,000 votes (actually 9,000 according to their filing) about which the Gore campaign has been complaining constitute only 1.6% of the ballots cast in Miami-Dade. These ballots were counted - twice; they merely registered no vote for President * This reality reflects common sense: a voter may want to vote for a candidate for the Senate, House or other office, but be undecided about the choice for President. In particular, a voter who usually votes for candidates from one party may vote for local or statewide candidates, but be uncomfortable with his or her party's choice for President and yet unwilling to vote for the other party's candidate. So he or she might cast a ballot without marking a choice for President. MYTH: If you counted all the votes that already have been counted in some of the recount, Gore would actually be ahead by 9 votes. FACT: * Democrats get to this number by adding unreported and unofficial votes from the late manual recount in Palm Beach and from the partial manual recount from Miami-Dade, and by subtracting the valid military overseas ballots and some of the certified votes from Nassau County. * The Florida Supreme Court set a deadline of 5 p.m. on Sunday for completing manual recounts, almost tripling the statutory time period for counting mandated by Florida's Legislature. * Palm Beach did not complete its manual recount by the Supreme Court's deadline. Miami-Dade returned to its original decision of not proceeding with a manual recount. * The 157 "interim gain" for Gore in Miami-Dade came from a selective recount of the most Democrat precincts. Gore won these selected precincts by approximately 75% to 25%, while Gore won the entire county only by 53% to 46%. It would be unfair to use this interim change without counting Republican precincts, too. * Precincts in Miami-Dade, including those with predominantly Hispanic and Cuban American voters, favored Bush. The Gore approach would treat these minorities in a discriminatory fashion. * Military overseas ballots that were valid under Florida and federal law should be counted. Counties recognized this and counted them. Even Joe Lieberman said that such military ballots should not be rejected. & Even if you add the 157 interim gain for Gore in Miami-Dade and the final manual recount of net 192 for Gore in Palm Beach (as reported by the NYT), and then also subtract the over 50 votes that belong to Bush in Nassau County (see below), Bush still wins by well over 100 votes. MYTH: Miami-Dade would have conducted a manual recount if not for the Republican "mob" that "intimidated" the canvassing board. KLAIN: "We think already almost 160 votes were counted in Dade County before the mob stopped the count.... But I think that to say that a mob can storm a counting facility, stop a count, and then that's going to provide the end because a partisan of the Bush campaign, Ms. Harris, refuses to accept returns and cuts off the counting, I don't think that's the kind of end that we have to American elections." [GMA, 11/27/00] FACT: * The record shows that the crowd was reacting to the Board's decision to move the recount behind closed doors, where it could not be observed by the public or the media, and to limit the recount to only a select set of the votes. * No Board member mentioned the protests as a factor in the decision, and Judge Leahy of the Board has already stated clearly that he was not intimidated by the crowd. ???? The police made no arrests, received no assault complaints, and did not even instruct the crowd to desist. The crowd was quieted promptly. MYTH: In Nassau County, the board violated Florida law by adding votes from earlier tabulations that had been rejected by the board as illegal. FACT: * On election night, all the votes were counted, but during the machine recount, 218 ballots were accidentally separated from the rest, and not counted. As a result, Bush received 124 fewer votes and Gore received 73 fewer votes than on election night. * After the recount, the Nassau County Board supervisor discovered her mistake, and tried to correct it. Because the Supreme Court of Florida had held the date open for final certification until Sunday at 5:00 p.m., the Division of Elections informed the supervisor that she could revise the count to make it accurate. * The Board (2 Democrats and 1 Republican) voted unanimously to certify the original election night count - which included the 218 ballots - rather than the machine recount total (which mistakenly omitted those ballots). ******************************************************* QUOTES: Mr. Gore, the Wheel has Turned and it's Time for this to End... "I think the vice president should take the high ground and hand it over," Rep. Julia Carson, D-IN - Associated Press interview conducted over the phone, 11/27/00. "Mr. Gore, End It Now," - Editorial headline in the Chicago Tribune, 11/27/00 "Enough is enough, For nation's welfare, Gore should accept loss," - Editorial headline in the San Diego Union-Tribune, 11/27/00 "...I have grave doubts about whether it is wise for the country, for the purposes of just healing all of the wounds, for the vice president to continue to pursue and to contest the results in Florida." - Former Clinton/Gore Labor Secretary Robert Reich "His determination to keep fighting, even after Sunday night's formal declaration that George W. Bush won the presidential race in Florida, presents the increasingly unappealing portrait of a man who wants to be a winner at any cost." - Chicago Tribune, Editorial, 11/27/00 "The only thing to be gained by contesting the Florida balloting, as Sen. Joseph Lieberman vowed last night to do, is to put the nation through a divisive ordeal that could provoke a constitutional crisis unprecedented in modern times." - San Diego Union-Tribune, Editorial, 11/27/00 Palm Beach Canvassing Judge Charles Burton: "...going into this, we felt that whatever standard we came up with...it had to be fair, it had to be geared towards achieving a fair result, not geared towards achieving a certain result... "...the Democratic Party, the Republican Party, everybody agreed to the standard we had applied in reviewing these ballots. It was only after about four days into it that the Democratic Party went back to court to try and, you know, basically have us change that standard because I guess they realized they weren't getting enough votes." - ABC's "Good Morning America," 11/27/00 *********************************************************************** Help the RNC fight for fair elections! 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