Bergan still ahead after preliminary vote recount Friday

Three Winneshiek County poll workers met Friday morning at the Courthouse to review 42 ballots which arrived in the County Auditors Office after Election Day.

29 of the ballots were not counted because they were not postmarked by the Waterloo Post Office.  Election law says any ballot which has a postmark by the day before the election must be counted--but without a postmark, it cannot be allowed.

That left just 13 ballots for the poll workers to count.  Of those 13 ballots, seven were votes for Democrat Kayla Koether and 6 were for Republican Michael Bergan.  Those votes pushed the Winneshiek County totals to 4,693 votes for Koether and 4,012 votes for Bergan.  However, Iowa House District 55 also includes portions of Fayette county and Clayton County, where Bergan polled more votes than Koether.

As a result, Bergan now leads--by seven votes out of 14,000 ballots cast.

Winneshiek County Supervisors will meet at noon Tuesday for their official vote canvas.  The results then will be sent to Des Moines, where the Secretary of State Office compiles official results.