Among countless other litigation-related decisions surrounding the outcome of the 2020 election, President Donald Trump is now forced to weigh whether or not he’s willing to spend vast amounts of money for official recounts in states that he lost by narrow margins to former Vice President Joe Biden.
According to the Daily Wire, one of those states is Wisconsin, where Trump lost to Biden by a narrow six-tenths of a point. Because of the thin margins, Trump is entitled to request an official state recount, but only if he’s willing to shell out a whopping $7.9 million to cover the costs of such a herculean effort.
The Wisconsin Elections Commission broke the news to the president this week, informing him that recounts are provided free of charge if the margin between winning and losing falls at 0.25 percent or less. Anything higher than that margin requires the person requesting the recount to fork out the money to cover it.
Adding to the president’s decision is the fact that the WEC informed Trump and his legal team that they only have until close of business this Wednesday to order the recount. If Trump’s team moves forward with it, the state would be forced to act quickly and finish the recount by December 1.
While it’s not uncommon for recounts to cost a lot, the $7.9 million price tag is abnormally high compared to elections as recent as 2016, when it was roughly a quarter of that cost. However, it was also noted that should Trump lay out the money for a Wisconsin recount and the estimated costs proved higher than reality, Trump would receive a partial refund.
So, why is it so much higher this year? COVID-19, of course. At least that’s what the WEC said when posed with the same question.
Many of the larger expenses for such an endeavor would be a result of rental fees for convention centers and ballot scanning machines necessary to perform a statewide recount. As the Daily Wire pointed out, expenses in Milwaukee County alone would easily be in the $2 million range.
As of this writing, there appears to be no word on whether or not the state has been instructed to prep for a possible recount, as the state’s election chief, Meagan Wolfe, recently relayed in a statement.
“We still have not received any indication that there will or will not be a recount. But we want Wisconsin’s voters to know we are ready,” Wolfe said.
Trump’s lawyers, especially former Mayor Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, appear to have their sights set on legal actions in the state of Pennsylvania, with other figures in Trump’s legal army scattered around in various battleground states.
Only time will tell if they pursue further action in the state of Wisconsin, but after expenses are weighed, hopefully they continue to exhaust all realistic efforts of making sure the 2020 election was as fair as it could possibly be.