As his lead in the Senate race shrinks, Republican Florida Gov. Rick Scott sues 2 Democratic counties


On Thursday night, Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R), who ran for Senate against incumbent Sen. Bill Nelson (D), filed suit against Broward and Palm Beach counties, accusing "unethical liberals" of trying to steal the election.
Scott is suing as a Senate candidate, not the governor. On Tuesday night, the race was too close to call, with Scott in the lead. The race has tightened as more votes have been counted, and Scott is now asking the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to investigate the official counts. Scott claims that Broward County and Palm Beach County supervisors are engaging in "rampant fraud," and he alleged that "left-wing activists in Broward County have been coming up with more and more ballots out of nowhere."
As of Thursday night, Scott has 15,092 more votes than Nelson, The Tampa Bay Times reports. Dan McLaughlin, a spokesman for Nelson, called Scott's action "politically motivated and borne out of desperation," and said "the goal here is to see that all the votes in Florida are counted and counted accurately."
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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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