...precincts are expected to meet short deadlines.

Which is par for the course for Republicans in power

Total bullshit!! They can't get away with this shit AGAIN!!!!

What's so f'ing sacrosanct about a damn date?

Why aren't they suing Rick Scott for not performing his job as Governor to ensure that the election would be seamless?

the GOP will take this all the way to the Supreme Court? We all know how that will turn out.

when Trump meets the deadline for returning all separated children to their parents?

A recount is done when all the ballots are counted. Or so it would be in a high functioning democracy.

Shelby County vs Holder was such a wrong a decision.

There are state guidelines that kick in regarding recounts. Do these guidelines also stipulate the time-frame in which the recounts must be completed, or are they arbitrary time limits set by the AG or commissioner of elections? These guidelines are set for one recount, but there are three recounts going on. If RepubliCANT'S want to get nasty and litigate there seems to be more than enough ammunition for the Democrats to counter-sue the scumbags.

since the law requires the impossible, which is injurious to Dems? Is there a leagal beagle here who can answer this?

This is a common theme with these two particular counties in every election. It just happens to be under the microscope this time around.

Statue 102.141(7)(c):

The canvassing board shall submit on forms or in formats provided by the division a second set of unofficial returns to the Department of State for each federal, statewide, state, or multicounty office or ballot measure. The returns shall be filed no later than 3 p.m. on the 5th day after any primary election and no later than 3 p.m. on the 9th day after any general election in which a recount was ordered by the Secretary of State. If the canvassing board is unable to complete the recount prescribed in this subsection by the deadline, the second set of unofficial returns submitted by the canvassing board shall be identical to the initial unofficial returns and the submission shall also include a detailed explanation of why it was unable to timely complete the recount. However, the canvassing board shall complete the recount prescribed in this subsection, along with any manual recount prescribed in s. 102.166, and certify election returns in accordance with the requirements of this chapter.

I don't know how to read the legislative history to see when this was changed. It might have been pursuant to the mess in Nov. 2000. It might be what SCOTUS was referring to as the deadline for providing a "safe harbor". Dunno.

Don't know why there were so few machines pressed into service for this. But they might make the deadline, you never know.

Or maybe somebody will simply declare it an emergency. After all, anything that makes anybody miss a deadline is an emergency to the person who stands to benefit from extending the deadline.

deadline? There were double digit more votes cast this year. The antiquated machines can only handle so many ballots. Let the ballot counting machines run until the votes are counted.

Whether or not they can legally overturn a distinct deadline established by the Florida legislature is a different matter

to complete their counts, and they're expected to look at all ballots, mail-ins as well as provisional ballots and damaged ones. And we have some rather large counties. Somehow, California never seems to have the continual messes that Florida does.

There could be several reasons for that: elections aren't so close (except for the races that are, and there are some every election), or the ballots are less complicated (but they're long: mine was 6 pages, half of which were state and local propositions). Or maybe it's because California has had Democratic Secretaries of State who think that voting should be accessible, and that every ballot should be counted.

Might I suggest using a second machine?

That asshole with his eyes bulging out from the 2000 recount is a prime example of how they made sure to slow things down knowing the clock was ticking as they spent 5 minutes staring at every ballot.