Florida's 13th congressional district

Florida's 13th congressional district
Current Representative		Vern Buchanan (R)
Population (2000)	639,295
Median income	$40,187
Ethnicity	90.2% White, 4.5% Black, 0.8% Asian, 7.7% Hispanic, 0.3% Native American, 0.2% other
Cook PVI	R+6

Florida's 13th congressional district encompasses all of Sarasota, DeSoto, and Hardee County, and most of Manatee County, except for a small northern coastal portion in District 11. It also includes a small section of Charlotte County. It is currently represented by Republican Vern Buchanan. John McCain received 52% of the vote in this district in 2008. The district has a Cook Partisan Voting Index score of R +4.

Voting

2006 election controversy

In the 2006 election, election officials certified Republican businessman Vern Buchanan as the winner of the race over Democratic candidate, banker Christine Jennings by 369 votes. Buchanan was declared the winner after a mandatory recount and analysis of alleged voting machine errors in the race. The primary controversy in this race is that over 18,000 ballots, roughly 1 in 6, cast in Sarasota County apparently did not register a vote for this race, far higher than in the two previous elections involving Jan Schneider, but lower than the undervote in 2000. Sarasota County voted for Jennings by a 6 point margin. Jennings refused to conceded the race, and is pursued administrative and legal challenges to the result, including filing an appeal for an investigation of the election with the House Administration Committee.^[1] Preliminary results from an investigation by Congress' Government Accountability Office concluded that there was no evidence that the voting machines caused the high undervote, but that inadequate testing made it impossible to prove their complete reliability.^[2] Sarasota County has since moved to optical scanned paper ballots as a result of a 2006 referendum vote.

According to a statistical study published in 2008,^[3] the missing votes were caused by the ballot screen layout. The authors' best estimate on what the result would have been, had this problem not occurred, give victory to Jennings at a 99.9% confidence level, and a mean margin of victory for her of 639 votes.

External links

• Voting inquiry finds reasons to dig deeper (Sarasota Herald-Tribune, August 04, 2007)
• Congressional task force to begin investigating contested Florida 13 election. (The Bradenton Herald, March 31, 2007)
• Congressional Republicans act to block Congressional Task Force slated to begin investigation into Florida 13. (Sarasota Herald-Tribune, March 28, 2007)
• Memo on voting machines "misfiled" by Kathy Dent's office. (Sarasota Herald-Tribune, March 17, 2007)
• People for the American Way Statement on Newly Revealed ES&S Memo on Possible Machine Malfunction. (People for the American Way, March 15, 2007)
• August 2006 Memo from Elections Systems and Software warning Florida Supervisors of Elections of a response time issue on their iVotronics touchscreen voting systems.
• Sarasota: Could a Bug Have Lost Votes? (Professor Ed Felten, February 27, 2006)
• Software Review and Security Analysis of the ES&S iVotronic 8.0.1.2 Voting Machine Firmware, Final Report. (Florida Department of State, February, 2007)
• Affidavit by Clare Ward-Jenkins, poll worker in Precinct 14, Sarasota County. Ms. Ward-Jenkins' affidavit details her encounters with a bug that repeatedly cleared votes cast for Democratic Congressional candidate, Christine Jennings., January 19, 2007)
• Analysis: Undervoted ballots heavily favored Democrats. (Orlando Sentinel, November 22, 2006)
• Buchanan declared winner; rival Jennings sues (Sarasota Herald-Tribune, November 21, 2006)
• Christine Jennings' "Complaint to Contest Election" (Filed in Florida Court, November 20, 2006)
• Sarasota County Electronic Ballot Screenshots (Posted on The BradBlog, November 20, 2006)
• Christine Jennings' web site.
• Vern Buchanan's Congressional web site.

Sources