The third place finisher in the Republican primary for the Texas House district that includes Burleson and Milam counties gets a recount of paper ballots.
HD 17 also includes Lee, Bastrop, and Caldwell counties.
Tom Glass, who lives on a ranch in western Lee County, finished 424 votes out of a runoff in the five person primary.
In a statement, Glass said that he has not seen evidence that election administrators did anything questionable.
He cited allegations of remote hacking of Texas electronic voting systems in the 2020 presidential race to request a recount of paper ballots.
Glass thanked more than 100 donors who paid the $5,600 dollar deposit that is required for the recount.
Glass says the recount will be done in Burleson, Lee, Bastrop, and Caldwell counties, which have paper backup systems. He said that represents around 81% of the primary ballots that were cast.
News release from the Tom Glass campaign:
Tom Glass, Republican candidate for Texas House District 17, has submitted a petition to the Republican Party of Texas to manually recount the paper ballots instead of relying on the electronic results in his race.
Explaining his reasoning for requesting the recount, Tom Glass said, “As a retired systems security specialist, I am aware of the many ways electronic voting systems can be compromised. I worked for many years to see that Texas election systems have paper ballot backups which can be used to check the integrity of electronic systems. If a tool for verification of election integrity is not used, it has no value.”
Four of the five counties in House District 17 (Bastrop, Caldwell, Burleson, and Lee Counties) have paper backup systems, so those are the counties where the manual paper recount will be done. That represents around 81% of the ballots cast in the race.
“I did not have funds for the $5,600 deposit required to conduct the recount,” Glass said. “But I am gratified that over 100 donors chipped in to pay to explore whether there were electronic compromises in this race. No public funds are spent on a recount.”
“I have seen no evidence that has led me to conclude that the election administrators in House District 17 did anything questionable. They do a demanding job which presents many challenges,” Glass said. “But given allegations of remote hacking of Texas electronic systems in the 2020 presidential race, many Texans want to know for sure that our Texas elections are not compromised.”
“It is my reading of Texas election law that only a few candidates in any cycle are positioned to be able to request a recount. My understanding is that if I did not take this step, the opportunity for the people of Texas to see results of a manual paper recount in this cycle might not have happened, and that was another motivator for pushing for the recount.” Tom Glass said.
According to unofficial results, Glass came in third in a five way race, just 424 votes out of the second place slot that would have put him in the runoff.