Democrat Delays Conceding in Primary Loss After Recount Flips Result

A winner has officially been called in the Democratic primary for Connecticut’s 91st state House district after a recount of the August 13 election, although one of the candidates said she is waiting to concede.
Laurie Sweet, town council member in Hamden, Connecticut, was declared the winner of the primary on Tuesday following a recount of last week’s election results, taking the win away from Sweet’s opponent, Jennifer Pope, who had been declared the winner of the primary by two votes on August 13. The slim lead, however, triggered a recount of the election, during which officials discovered additional ballots that were not initially counted.
Pope told the Associated Press (AP) on Wednesday that she was surprised by the recount results and is not conceding until she and her team speak further.
“I’m still talking with my team about what our next steps should be,” Pope told AP. “There is quite a few irregularities that came out in yesterday’s recount.”
Newsweek reached out to Pope’s team via email for additional comment Wednesday evening.
The primary election had been caught in limbo for roughly a week. On election night, Pope conceded to Sweet, who was declared the winner by 69 votes in a preliminary result count. Sweet gave an acceptance speech on the night of the primary as well, AP reported, only for the official count to ultimately favor Pope.
But according to a report from the Connecticut Post, officials discovered that a polling place in southern Hamden had run out of ballots on the night of the primary, and instead gave voters photocopies of the ballots. The photocopied ballots, however, could not be fed through the tabulator used to count the results, and were missed in the official count on election night.
AP reported that Sweet felt confident in the recount, which found that she had won 947 to 932. Sweet is a member of the Connecticut Democratic Socialists and was endorsed by the progressive Working Families Party. Pope was endorsed by the Hamden Democratic Town Committee.
“As state representative, I will continue the work that I started on the Legislative Council, as a champion for Hamden’s workers, tenants, students, and more at the Capitol,” Sweet said in a statement on Tuesday.
Pope told the Connecticut Mirror on Wednesday: “Obviously I’m disappointed that I didn’t come out ahead yesterday, but I appreciate the support of my team and my family and all of the voters who came out to vote.”