NY-23 absentee counts, Day 2
Fulton County has reported results from the 325 absentee ballots cast in the 23rd Congressional District race. Conservative Party candidate Douglas L. Hoffman picked up 179 votes, Democrat William L. Owens added 84 votes and Republican Dierdre K. Scozzafava gained 62 votes.
An Essex County elections board official said they won't make their results known until Monday. St. Lawrence County will start tabulating results tomorrow.
Jefferson, Oswego, Franklin and Clinton are working on absentees for the second straight day. All four did not finish today.
Here is the table with the new unofficial results:
| Owens | Hoffman | Dede | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Clinton | 10536 (68) | 7530 (58) | 686 (23) |
| Essex | 3718 (0) | 3175 (0) | 432 (0) |
| Franklin | 5,125 (0) | 4,589 (0) | 247(0) |
| Fulton | 1969 (84) | 2489 (179) | 676 (62) |
| Hamilton | 888 (60) | 1184 (85) | 293 (87) |
| Jefferson | 10460 (164) | 10884 (165) | 1179 (151) |
| Lewis | 2169 (0) | 2676 (0) | 282 (0) |
| Madison | 8087 (203) | 8985 (170) | 602 (122) |
| Oneida | 2024 (219) | 2779 (446) | 362 (97) |
| Oswego | 11000 (276) | 12748 (315) | 950 (123) |
| St. Lawrn | 12987 (0) | 8748 (0) | 1,194 (0) |
| Total | 70,037 | 67,205 | 7,558 |
| % of vote | 48.7 | 46.4 | 4.9 |
Note: Jefferson, Oswego and Clinton counties' numbers are incomplete. Oswego has reported 55.6 percent of absentees. Jefferson has reported 36.3 percent of absentees. Clinton has reported 12.8 percent of absentees.
With 42.6 percent of all absentees counted, Mr. Hoffman has gained 344 votes on Mr. Owens so far. Mr. Owens, however, still leads by 2,832 votes.
If the current percentages hold, Mr. Owens will win by 2,368 votes.
Simply put, Ms. Scozzafava's strong performance in absentees is making Mr. Hoffman's chances of winning creep closer to "impossible."
The Republican is grabbing 21.1 percent of the absentees so far.
There are 4,262 absentee ballots remaining. If Ms. Scozzafava takes 21 percent of those, Mr. Hoffman will need 3,099 to pass Mr. Owens. That's 92 percent of the remaining pie - absolutely unheard of.
