Virginia’s congressional primaries took place on June 18. The Republican primary for Old Dominion’s fifth congressional district was so close that the state’s elections office only announced the race now – on July 2 – and declared State Senator John McGuire III the winner over incumbent Representative Bob Good.
News: The Virginia Department of Elections has officially declared John McGuire the winner over HFC
Chairman Bob Good. https://t.co/904xYy5fpg pic.twitter.com/C28Lacj3Ha– Reese Gorman (@reesejgorman) July 2, 2024
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As Republicans in the House of Representatives try to maintain their majority, Trump targets Freedom Caucus Chairman Bob Good
With the current vote difference of 0.6 percent and only 374 votes difference between the two (out of almost 63,000 votes in total), Good, chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, expected to request a recount. However, since the difference is greater than 0.5 percent, Good must bear the costs of the recount himself.
The Virginia State Board of Elections on Tuesday certified the apparently narrow defeat of Republican Rep. Bob Good, one of America’s most conservative members of Congress, to a challenger backed by former President Donald Trump in the state’s June 18 primary election.
But the panel’s unanimous decision to certify the results does not end the matter. Good, chairman of the far-right House Freedom Caucus in Congress, has announced that he will request a recount after the state declared his opponent, Senator John McGuire, the winner of the primary in Virginia’s 5th congressional district.
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Good has announced that he will seek both a recount and legal action to prevent a McGuire victory. On social media, he called for a “re-run” in Lynchburg, the district’s largest city and a Good stronghold, citing alleged irregularities there.
Good and others claimed the city botched the vote count by Acceptance of ballots from a mailbox after election night.
The Lynchburg Registrar has stated that due to a procedural error, seven ballots were not retrieved from a mailbox until the Friday after the election, rather than on election night. However, the Registrar said they I believe the ballots were cast on election day and that no one saw the seven ballots being cast after election day.
Good’s campaign team also expressed skepticism in a social media post about the three fire alarms that went off at polling places in three different precincts on Election Day.
On Tuesday evening, Good confirmed that he would request a recount.
After the preliminary certification of the primary is complete, we will begin the recount. In a race of nearly 63,000 votes, with the margin of victory just 0.6%, Republican voters in the 5th District have a right to know that all legal votes were accurately counted…
— Bob Good for Congress (@GoodForCongress) July 2, 2024
After preliminary certification of the primary is complete, we will begin the recount. In a race that included nearly 63,000 votes and a 0.6% margin, Republican voters in the 5th District have a right to know that all legal votes were counted correctly. We will vigorously pursue that goal in the days and weeks ahead, to the extent Virginia law allows.
Good’s campaign team has ten days to request a recount.
