How does recount work in Pennsylvania? What to know as Senate race hangs in balance

The U.S. Senate election in Pennsylvania between Democratic Sen. Bob Casey and Republican challenger David McCormick is officially heading for a recount.

The secretary of the commonwealth announced on Nov. 13 that a statewide recount is legally required based on the race’s unofficial results — which have Casey narrowly trailing McCormick.

The announcement comes after multiple news outlets, including the Associated Press, projected that McCormick would win the election, and after McCormick himself declared victory.

Casey, on the other hand — who has served in the Senate since 2007 — has not conceded.

On Nov. 11, he wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter, “Our Commonwealth ran a free and fair election, and we are still waiting on the final results.”

The recount, which could take days, will have implications for the narrow Republican majority in the Senate.

How the recount works

“Pennsylvania state law since 2004 has required a recount in any statewide election where the margin between the top two candidates is less than 0.5%,” Robert Speel, a professor of political science at Pennsylvania State University Behrend, told McClatchy News.

As of Nov. 13, the margin of difference between the two candidates was 0.43% — with 3,380,310 ballots cast for McCormick and 3,350,972 cast for Casey.

The state’s 67 counties will now have to begin their recounts by Nov. 20, according to the secretary of the commonwealth. The recounts must be finished by Nov. 26, and final results will be released on Nov. 27.

The process, which could cost more than $1 million of tax payer funds to complete, will largely be conducted via electronic scanners, Speel said.

In addition to the millions of ballots that will be recounted, there are about 80,000 outstanding uncounted provisional and mail-in ballots in the state. However, some of them could be invalidated by county boards of elections.

“Many of those provisional ballots will not get counted because a voter was not registered or didn’t vote at the proper location,” Speel said. “The McCormick and Casey campaigns are already battling about whether to count some of those provisional and mail ballots.”

What’s likely to happen?

Experts cast doubt on the likelihood of Casey winning in the recount.

“In my opinion, a recount is unlikely to result in a change in outcome; that is, there will not be enough votes counted differently to allow Sen. Casey to overcome the margin of victory currently held by Mr. McCormick,” Jonathan Cervas, a professor of political science at Carnegie Mellon University, told McClatchy News.

Similarly, Daniel Hopkins, a professor of political science at the University of Pennsylvania, told McClatchy News, “I would just say that the chances of Senator Casey winning a recount with such a wide margin are very low.”

In the past, recounts have seldom resulted in a reversal of the original outcome.

Of 36 statewide recounts between 2000 and 2023, just three resulted in reversals, according to an analysis by FairVote, a nonpartisan organization that researches elections.

Additionally, “unofficial counts are more accurate today than in the past because of improvements to voting technologies,” making it even more unlikely that Casey will prevail, Cervas said.