The presidential election of 2000 between the Texas governor George W. Bush and Vice President Al Gore was one of the most chaotic and controversial elections. After all of the other states voted, it came down to Florida to vote for the President of the United States. Many argued to recount the votes because the undervotes and dimpled chads resulted in a close vote. The butterfly ballot, used in Florida, is a ballot in which there are two columns of names of the candidates on the ballot. On the butterfly ballot, the citizen voted by punching a hole in the center. Theresa Lepore, who invented of the butterfly ballot, discussed with Tony Enos, an election board employee, about whether or not to use the butterfly design prior to its release. They both agreed it was easier to read because the font was larger. However, this design caused more problems and confusion because it was unclear to see which hole matched which candidate. This confusion led to a large number of undervotes, and many had concerns with this due to how close the votes were. Not only did citizens mix up choosing the right candidate, they also struggled with punching the chad completely through, which resulted in either a hanging chad or a dimpled chad. A hanging chad is a chad that the citizen did not completely remove and hangs on by a corner. When put through the mechanical counter, the machine pushes the chads back up causing the machine recognized as no vote. A dimpled chad is a chad that the citizen punched, but all four corners remain attached to the ballot. Many asked to get a revote considering they are citizens and their vote should count. This did not work in their favor because the state of Florida doesn’t allow for a revote because on the ballot there are directions on how to vote correctly.
Many of the votes were recounted but many counties did not allow recounting of votes. I feel the electoral college votes for a state represent the entire state and all of its counties. So a recount should be allowed in all the counties within the state. Also a democratic party would only choose to recount votes from a democratic county, it would be fair to recount votes from all counties. I don’t believe undervotes should count because it’s hard to tell who they really voted for and it would only