JEB IS BACK – AT 11:21 P.M. ET:  Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush has gotten into the recount fray.  He was an excellent governor whose career was sidetracked by the emergency of Donald Trump.  I hope he gets back into public life.  From Fox:

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush added his voice to the growing number of Republicans calling for Brenda Snipes, the Broward supervisor of elections, to be removed from her post amid the controversy over the vote recount in Florida's pivotal races for governor and Senate.

“There is no question that Broward County Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes failed to comply with Florida law on multiple counts, undermining Floridians’ confidence in our electoral process,” Bush tweeted on Monday. “Supervisor Snipes should be removed from her office following the recounts.”

Along with Bush, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., has also suggested Snipes should be removed from office once the dust settles in the Florida races.

In Snipes’ Broward County, the recount was delayed for hours Sunday because of a problem with one of the tabulation machines. That prompted the Republican Party to accuse Snipes of "incompetence and gross mismanagement."

Broward officials faced further headaches after acknowledging the county mistakenly counted 22 absentee ballots that had been rejected. The problem seemed impossible to fix because dismissed ballots were mixed in with 205 legal ballots and Snipes said it would be unfair to throw out all the votes.

Gov. Rick Scott, the Republican candidate for Senate, filed suit against Snipes. He's seeking a court order for law enforcement agents to impound all voting machines, tallying devices and ballots "when not in use until such time as any recounts." The suit accused Snipes of repeatedly failing to account for the number of ballots left to be counted and failing to report results regularly as required by law.

COMMENT:  Florida is one of the most important states politically in our country.  It ranks fourth in population, and will eventually overtake New York to be third.  Republicans have little chance of turning the first state, California, red, and are finding increasing opposition in the second state, Texas.  The Republican Party must make Florida a firewall, and incompetent handling of elections will not make the job easier. Jeb is right.

November 12,  2018