Tabulation error gives hope to GOP candidate in NY-1

By Rick Moran

A rare human error transferring tabulated votes to the computer results has given hope to GOP challenger Randy Altshuler in NY-1:

Officials in Suffolk County said the error, discovered Friday, shifted several thousand votes and erased Bishop's 3,500 vote margin. That put Republican challenger Randy Altshuler ahead by just under 400 votes in New York's 1st Congressional District. Bishop is seeking a fifth term in the district, which includes many of New York's beach communities.
Board of Elections Commissioner Wayne Rogers told the Associated Press the original numbers came in by telephone on election night and "must have been transcribed incorrectly" and fed into the computer system as figures were relayed through the system by intermediaries. The error turned up in a routine check of voting machine memory cards.

It's not over. Some 9,000 absentee ballots have yet to the counted, the AP said.

Politico is reporting that the new tally gives Altshuler a 392 vote lead with those 9,000 ballots still to be counted. Also, the Altshuler camp has asked that the machine votes be impounded. If Altshuler's lead holds up, it would represent a dramatic turnaround for Republican fortunes in New York:

This is a pretty dramatic turn of events in a race in which even many Republicans privately thought Altschuler should have conceded earlier this week.
I noted earlier today that if NY-25 is won by GOPer Ann Marie Buerkle when the absentee ballots are finished, it will put the Republicans at six House seats captured here. Altschuler would be seven, and an astonishing feat for the national GOP.

Prior to the election, the GOP claimed only 2 House seats in all of New York state.