Update: Friday 5:30 p.m. — After two and a half days of recounting ballots, the New Hanover County Board of Elections released results showing no change in the outcome of local races (the state has not yet updated its website).
Below, the updated results with net change in totals.
Board of Commissioners:
- Bill Rivenbark (R) — 62,797 (-5)
- Stephanie Walker (D) — 61,468 (-1)
- Dane Scalise (R) — 61,425 (+2)
- Jonathan Barfield Jr. (D) — 61,176 (-3)
- John Hinnant (R) — 59,264 (+1)
- Cassidy Santaguida (D) — 58,819 (no change)
Board of Education
- Judy Justice (D) — 63,846 (-2)
- Tim Merrick (D) — 62,007 (-3)
- David Perry (R) — 60,912 (-6)
- Jerry Jones Jr. (D) — 60,606 (-10)
- Nikki Bascome (R) — 59,887 (-9)
- Natosha Tew (R) — 58,306 (-1)
After last Thursday’s accounting of additional absentee ballots, the ranking — but not the outcome — of the races for school board and county commissioner seats were shifted. Candidates Jonathan Barfield and Jerry Jones were both in fourth place in races for three seats, within the recount margin.
State law defines the recount margin as 1% of the total votes cast for any two candidates. In the commissioners' race, that means 1,226 votes or less between Barfield and Republican incumbent Dane Scalise, who fell to third place behind Democrat Stephanie Walker after Thursday’s count. Currently, 244 votes separate Barfield and Scalise.
The margin for Jones and the third-place candidate, Republican David Perry, is 1,215 — with Jones trailing by 302 votes.
While both candidates are well within the recount margin, a recount is unlikely to shift the votes significantly enough to upset the races.
The 2022 recount in the New Hanover County Democratic primary shifted the school board race by just a few votes – albeit with only roughly 20% of the turnout of this year’s race. The 2016 statewide audit triggered by the state auditor’s race shifted the vote by just a few dozen out of roughly five million cast. In the local recount for the commissioner race in New Hanover County that same year, the fourth and fifth place candidates — Julia Boseman and Derrick Hickey — both needed several hundred votes; Boseman picked up six, Hickey just four.
A recount is also possible in the extremely close state Supreme Court race between incumbent Justice Allison Riggs, a Democrat, and Appeals Court Judge Jefferson Griffin, the Republican challenger. On Monday morning, Riggs led by just two dozen votes out of roughly 5.5 million cast, although several counties have yet to report their final votes.
The New Hanover County Board of Elections will meet at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, November 20, in the Paynter Room at the Northeast Library, located at 1241 Military Cutoff Road for the recount. The meeting is open to the public but space is usually limited to less than 20 attendees.
