Rep. Baron Hill, D-Ind., is dropping his recount of
the Nov. 2 election after votes in six counties showed he was far
from overcoming the lead of Republican Mike Sodrel.
Sodrel defeated Hill by 1,485 votes on Election Day
to win the 9th Congressional District seat in southeastern
Indiana.
A county outside the district suffered a voting
machine glitch, miscounting some Democratic votes as Libertarian
votes; that prompted Democrats to seek the recount, since the same
type of equipment was used in three 9th District counties.
But Tuesday, after a recount in those three
counties and three more of the district's 20 counties showed Hill
picking up only a couple of dozen votes, Democrats decided it was
futile to continue.
"It is now clear that major irregularities did not
occur," Hill said in a statement that thanked constituents for
their patience and congratulated Sodrel.
Sodrel also issued a statement saying he had had
confidence in the election process and officials and had not
doubted the outcome.
A spokesman for Sodrel said the campaign would drop
efforts to look for voting fraud in Monroe County.
