Despite a recent recount, results in the Hays County Pct. 3 Commissioner’s race will remain the same, according to Hays County Election officials.
Incumbent Republican Lon Shell, who initially claimed the seat by a slim 37-vote margin Nov. 6, maintained his victory over Democratic challenger Jimmy Alan Hall, according to results from the Nov. 26 recount.
Hall said with such a slim margin of victory for Shell, he owed it to his supporters to request a recount.
Hall said he had heard reports that voters in Precinct 332, who vote for races in Pct. 3, were prompted to vote in Pct. 2, leading him to believe an error had occurred in the system.
“When some people got through the ballot, they were voting in the Precinct 2 election,” Hall said. “How many of those occurred? I’m hopeful this process catches that, but that’s the problem with not having a paper trail system.”
Hall pointed to voting irregularities with Texas State University students, which, according to some reports, had some of the university population moving between polling locations, causing confusion during the voting process.
According to Hays County election officials, Hall originally requested a manual recount of all 20,153 votes. But after deliberating with county staff, the decision was made to recount mail and electronic ballots.
Jennifer Anderson, the elections administrator for Hays County, said the mail ballots, automatic tabulation, and all electronic votes were recounted. At the end of the five-hour recount period, the result from the election stood, with no disparities.
Additionally, Hall will be responsible for the cost associated with the recount since the decision did not change.
As the results stand, Shell received 10,095 votes compared to Hall’s 10,058.
However, in a social media post on the Kyle Buda Area Democrats page, Hall said there is a pending Public Information Act request for “all provisional ballots that the Ballot Board rejected,” as well as other records in the election.
“We believe that many of the rejected ballots were ones cast for the Democrat in this race,” according to Hall’s post. “I am continuing to fight to count every vote because it is the fair and equitable thing to do.”
