Follow-Up: Kansas Governor Unofficial Count Complete: Holscher Leads Masterson by 7,638 Votes, Hand-Count Audit Under Way, Recount Requests Due November 17
TOPEKA, KANSAS — The unofficial count in the Kansas governor’s race is complete, five days after Election Day. In the latest unofficial count from the Kansas Secretary of State's office, Democrat Cindy Holscher, a state senator, had 551,250 votes, or 50.3%, to 543,612, or 49.7%, for Republican Ty Masterson, the state Senate president — a gap of 7,638 votes, with all 105 counties reporting. The figures remain unofficial and take effect only after county canvasses and state certification; Holscher declared victory on Wednesday morning, November 4, while Masterson did not concede, saying the margin was narrow enough that Kansas law calls for another look and that the process should finish.
That process is under way. Secretary of State Scott Schwab announced a close-race audit on November 4. Under K.S.A. 25-3009, any federal, statewide or legislative race within 1 percentage point receives a post-election audit; six races qualify this cycle — governor, secretary of state, attorney general and Kansas House Districts 27, 40 and 117. County workers pull the paper ballots from 10% of precincts in every county, at least one per county, and count the race by hand. State elections director Bryan Caskey said counties would work from Thursday into the weekend so the audit is done before Monday, November 9, when county commissions start certifying results.
Two further dates frame the finish: mail ballots postmarked by Election Day still counted if they reached counties by Friday, November 6 — a court kept the three-day grace period in place after lawmakers passed a law to end it — and Masterson has until 5 p.m. on November 17 to request a full recount. Under Kansas law the state pays for a machine recount only if the margin is 0.5 percentage points or less; at the current margin of about 0.7 points, he would have to pay himself unless the gap shrinks before certification. The winner succeeds Governor Laura Kelly and is sworn in in January.
Source: Kansas Secretary of State
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：位于托皮卡的堪萨斯州议会大厦。图片来源：Wikimedia Commons（CC0）。 / Photo: The Kansas State Capitol in Topeka. Source: Wikimedia Commons (CC0).
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- 2026-11-08Follow-Up: Kansas Governor Unofficial Count Complete: Holscher Leads Masterson by 7,638 Votes, Hand-Count Audit Under Way, Recount Requests Due November 17This story
