Another recount won't be ordered in a North Carolina court race, but protests are ahead

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — North Carolina election officials won't order another recount in a close state Supreme Court race after a partial hand recount failed to suggest the trailing Republican candidate could overtake the Democratic incumbent.

Following the completion of a machine recount of over 5.5 million ballots last week, Democratic Associate Justice Allison Riggs maintained a 734-vote lead over Republican Jefferson Griffin, who is currently a state Court of Appeals judge. Griffin then requested a partial hand recount in which randomly chosen ballots from 3% of the voting sites in all 100 counties were reexamined.

The law says a statewide hand recount would have been required if the sample results differed enough so that the result would be reversed if the difference were extrapolated to all ballots. But the sample tabulations, which finished Tuesday, showed Riggs actually picking up more votes than Griffin. As a result, the State Board of Elections said a total recount won't be ordered.

The election, however, has not been fully resolved. The five-member state board was scheduled to hear arguments Wednesday on protests previously filed by Griffin and three GOP legislative candidates who also are in very close elections.

Riggs, one of two Democrats on the seven-member court, declared victory again on Tuesday, and her campaign renewed calls for Griffin to concede. Griffin didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

The protests going before the state board, which question if well over 60,000 ballots should have been counted, cover three categories of voting. They include votes cast by people with voter registration records that lack driver’s licenses or partial Social Security numbers; overseas voters who have never lived in North Carolina but whose parents were deemed state residents; and military or...