Democrats and Republicans scratched for votes across Florida as Al Gore and George W. Bush plotted strategies for Sunday when the state's top elections official certifies the longest, closest White House race in 124 years.
Broward County finished its counting just before midnight Saturday, adding enough votes to help cut Bush's tissue-thin statewide lead in half, to 464 votes, from the lead of 930 he had before the recounts.
In the only other county still recounting, Palm Beach, canvassers vowed to work through the night on several thousand ballots. Gore was reported by observers on both sides to have gained close to 100 more votes in the county - a disappointment to Democrats who had fading hopes the heavily Democratic county's recount would put him over the top.
As controversies erupted over a surprise cache of absentee ballots and the disparate standards for validating votes, Gore advisers said they doubted he would overtake the Texas governor before 5 p.m. EST Sunday, when Secretary of State Katherine Harris - a Republican and Bush campaigner - is supposed to certify Florida's new vote totals. Before the hand recounts, Bush had the 930-vote lead out of 6 million cast.
Gore plans to protest some county results in state courts Monday and the U.S. Supreme Court is hearing arguments four days later on Bush's case against recounts - meaning the nation may not know its 43rd president until legal wrangling wraps up deep in December.
Bush, too, was prepared to protest Harris' certification, whether or not Gore overtakes him. Under Florida law, the loser can challenge the election after it is certified, and the winner can file a ''counter-contest'' raising separate complaints.
''I don't think the idea that the election is over with the certification by Governor Bush's Florida campaign manager is going to get a lot of traction,'' said Gore lawyer David Boies.
The vice president's staff was making tentative plans for a Monday address by Gore, a senior adviser said on condition of anonymity. The speech would give the vice president a chance to explain why he was fighting the certification, they said, and set the stage for the historic clash before the U.S. Supreme Court.
The planning reflects the concern among Gore advisers that Democrats will begin to abandon their presidential candidate or the public will grow weary of the protracted legal fight. Across the country on Saturday, Democrats said Gore had reason to worry.
''Whatever the secretary of state has to say, somebody will contest those votes and at that point people are going to say, 'Enough is enough. It's time to put this puppy to bed,''' said Jim Duffy a Democratic strategist in Washington.
Former President Jimmy Carter, advancing Gore's argument for contesting the results, said in a statement released by the campaign: ''This may take time, but it is time well spent. ... We must not sacrifice accuracy for speed in deciding who has been chosen by the voters.''
Republicans were alarmed when hundreds of absentee ballots turned up in piles of disputed votes in Broward County, and they objected to plans to count them. Bush's lawyers, meanwhile, dropped a statewide lawsuit over rejected overseas absentee ballots, but sued Saturday in several counties - Hillsborough, Okaloosa, Pasco and Polk - to pad his lead with votes from military personnel. A lawsuit in Orange County was planned Sunday.
Republicans said the Sunday deadline offers a public relations opportunity for Bush - if he still leads Gore. Aides had not decided how to address the milestone. Whether or not Bush declares outright victory and suggests that Gore concede depends on the vote totals Sunday, a senior official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The totals may not be clear Sunday. Ben McKay, a spokesman for Harris, said the certification could take hours or even be delayed indefinitely if there is legal action or ''unforeseen circumstances. There could be an injunction ... the legislature could take it over,'' he said in a telephone interview, reflecting how unpredictable the recount has become.
Gore's staff estimated he will fall 300 to 400 votes short, though they didn't rule out the possibility that he could slip past Bush. One senior adviser pointed to the overseas absentee ballots and GOP activity in scattered counties to suggest Bush will pick up a surprising number of votes in the final hours of counting and may top Gore by 900 or more.
It was impossible to determine whether such dire talk was sincere or a desire to lower expectations. The same can be said of Bush aides, who held out the possibility that Gore could yet overtake them.
The U.S. Supreme Court stepped into the fiercely fought campaign Friday, agreeing to consider Bush's appeal against the hand recounting of ballots in Florida.
The Florida Supreme Court ruled last week that the recounts could continue, but set a 5 p.m. EST Sunday deadline. The order allows either Bush or Gore to contest the certified totals in state circuit court.
The Gore team announced Thanksgiving Day that he would challenge Harris' finding in certain counties, a move that even Bush's aides said acted to diminish the significance of her Sunday announcement.
The candidates laid low Saturday. Bush spent most of the day at his ranch in Texas and returned to the governor's mansion in the evening to a crowd of supporters yelling, ''President Bush! President Bush!'' Gore went out for chocolate-chip ice cream then returned to his official residence in Washington, where a handful of demonstrators massed. ''Get out of Cheney's house!'' chanted GOP protesters. Others backed Gore.
Vote-counting continued in Broward and Palm Beach counties, with officials using different standards and yielding different results.
In Broward County, officials finished examining all 2,422 questionable ballots just before midnight Saturday. Gore ended with an official net gain of 567 votes.
Tensions flared in the ballot counting room when a GOP observer raised repeated objections to the election board's decision to count absentee ballots. ''You're trolling for votes here because it's clear that you can't win this election,'' said GOP attorney William Scherer.
Board chairman Robert Lee tersely told Scherer not to return after a lunch break.
Organized by the Bush team, about 100 protesters stood outside in the drizzling rain as weather forecasters issues tornado warning. Democrats blamed similar protests for persuading Miami-Dade County officials to shut down their vote count Wednesday, handing Gore a major blow.
''Because someone paid for my hotel room, because someone paid for my plane ticket, I'm a thug?'' asked Terry Benham, an Arkansas Republican and lobbyist. Another sign in the crowd read: ''We are not from Rent-a-Mob.''
Up the southeast coast, Palm Beach County elections board member Carol Roberts said officials might work all night in an attempt to review 9,500 questionable ballots. The board will send partial results to the state if it fails to complete the hand count by Sunday's deadline. McKay, in the secretary of state's office, said the state canvassing board would have to ''make a determination'' on whether to accept incomplete results.
With two thirds of the precincts examined, Gore had gained between 50 and 100 votes, according to Democratic and Republican observers in Palm Beach County, a pace that angered and disappointed Democrats.
The vice president believes he is being held back in Palm Beach by officials who refuse to count ballots with indentations next to the vice president's name as votes.
Gore, assuming he falls short of Bush, plans to challenge the Sunday certification, alleging that:
- Palm Beach officials threw out too many ballots, refusing to adopt a liberal standard for determining the voters' intent.
-Officials in Miami-Dade County, a Democratic bastion, broke state law by shutting down its recount last week.
Gore's lawyers also contend that Palm Beach County's ballot design confused thousands of voters, including an unknown number of Democrats who say they mistakenly cast ballots for Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan. The Gore camp has collected 10,000 affidavits from voters who say they were confused by the ballot or given improper instructions by poll workers. Gore's lawyers have not ruled out a separate lawsuit.
One potential contest for Gore is Seminole County, near Orlando. In that heavily Republican county, the local supervisor of elections, a Republican, has acknowledged allowing GOP party officials into her office to correct errors in absentee ballot applications. Democrats did not get the same opportunity.
If Gore somehow overtakes Bush, the Texan's lawyers are prepared to contest certification on grounds that Broward County adopted too expansive a standard for approving votes. The disqualification of overseas ballots could also be an issue, said a senior Bush adviser.
Bush had filed suit seeking to force counties to reconsider overseas military ballots rejected for lack of a postmark or other problems. He shifted his legal strategy Saturday, seeking action in individual counties for recounts of the overseas ballots.
Six counties already have given the rejected ballots a second look, accepting scores of them and adding 67 votes to Bush's previous total. McKay said Harris would count the incoming absentee ballots.
Republicans, out of the White House for eight years, showed no sign of wavering in the fight against Gore.
Gore is having a harder time keeping rank-in-file Democrats in line, though the party leadership has been resolute thus far.
''I suppose if Gore is behind at that point Sunday, he will have evaporated more than half of the patience that Americans votes would have with this continuing,'' said Benjamin Matwey, a Democratic activist and former Delaware coordinator of Bill Bradley's failed primary campaign.
