Recount Ordered in Race With a 2-Vote Margin

A recount has been ordered for a congressional race in which unofficial final results show seven-term incumbent Democrat Sam Gejdenson winning by two votes.

Gejdenson received 79,169 votes to 79,167 for Republican challenger Edward M. Munster, the secretary of state’s office said. Third-party candidate David Bingham finished with 27,729 votes. A recount is automatic if the margin between candidates is less than 0.5% but not more than 2,000 votes.

Despite trailing in the first count, Munster made his plans for Washington, confident that the new count would favor him.

He issued a news release Thursday describing himself as “United States Congressman-elect.”

Gejdenson, meanwhile, ducked the spotlight and waited out the suspense in private. Bob Baskin, a spokesman for the Gejdenson campaign, said he is confident Munster will be defeated again.

Two years ago, Gejdenson defeated Munster, a former state senator, by 2 percentage points.

The 54 towns in eastern Connecticut’s 2nd District will have until Monday to conduct their recounts, and until Nov. 18 to submit new tallies. Results can be appealed to state Superior Court.

In another close race, meanwhile, the Democratic candidate for governor of Maryland remained ahead by several thousand votes Thursday as absentee ballots were tallied, but the Republican was chipping away at his lead.

By today, election officials were expected to know whether Ellen Sauerbrey had picked up enough votes to offset Parris Glendening’s 6,187-vote lead in the unofficial count Tuesday. More than 1.2 million ballots were cast.

With reports in from 14 counties, Sauerbrey had 9,379 absentee votes and Glendening 6,110. That cut his lead to 2,918 votes, but Glendening said he is confident.