No Runny Eggs

The only news yesterday was the count itself. Shortly before the Government Accountability Board released updated numbers, the Associated Press (via WISC-TV) reported on the fact that, with just under 1/3rd of the 13 days allowed by state law to complete the recount, 1/3rd of the reporting units had results reported. The 4:15 pm release from the GAB upped that to 1,847 of 3,602 reporting units completed and reviewed, and with 677,830 votes as-recounted, David Prosser extended his pre-recount lead over JoAnne Kloppenburg by 21 to an unofficial 7,337 votes.

I do have to note the current (at least as of 4:15 pm yesterday) version of GAB’s spreadsheet has what appears to be an error in the bottom-line totals; they reported 693,592 votes as recounted, with similar “errors” in each individual vote total. As every number on their spreadsheet is hand-entered, that may well include numbers from reporting units that were not individually reported on said spreadsheet.

Again, both the GAB and I stress that those results are both unofficial and do not reflect all the reporting units that have completed recounts. For example, media reports had Eau Claire County as having completed its recount on Friday afternoon, yet the results released by the GAB yesterday afternoon did not have all of the results from Eau Claire County entered.

With that said, it is the “easy” half that is done. The canvassing board in, say, Milwaukee County can’t farm out some of their work to the canvassing board in, say, Green Lake County, even though the latter board already finished their work. Indeed, in terms of ballots recounted, Milwaukee and Waukesha Counties, out of those counties that have reported any results, are the only two which are significantly in danger of not completing the recount by next week Monday.

Even with just the partial results, some statistical analysis on the change of votes is possible. In just the reporting units that have been recounted and reported by the GAB:

• David Prosser saw an increase of 187 votes, from the pre-recount canvassed total of 358,268 votes to a recounted 358,455 votes. That is a 0.0522% gain.
• JoAnne Kloppenburg saw an increase of 166 votes, from the pre-recount canvassed total of 318,527 votes to a recounted 318,693 votes. That is a 0.0521% gain.

Just as a reminder, Prosser’s pre-recount lead over Kloppenburg was 0.4881 percentage points.

Revisions/extensions (12:01 pm 5/2/2011) – Kyle Maichle reports there is a poll list (called “poll book” in his Twitter stream) “issue” in Brown Deer’s Wards 1-3 (yes, it is a single reporting unit despite containing multiple wards, and it is in Milwaukee County). That reporting unit went for Kloppenburg by a pre-recount 925-704 margin.