Hand recount canceled after Mike Lindell-endorsed candidate fails to come up with $8K

A California election recount was abruptly canceled this week after a candidate endorsed by Mike Lindell failed to pay the required fees.

Shasta County District 2 Supervisors candidate Laura Hobbs requested a hand recount after Allen Long won by more than 50% of the vote, just 13 more votes than needed to prevent a run-off.

Ultimately, the self-proclaimed MAGA candidate could not raise the $8,626 fee needed to proceed with the recount.

Shasta County's assistant registrar of voters Joanna Francescut said she was disappointed that the county could not demonstrate the process's transparency.

"The elections department had arranged the office to accommodate observers, candidates and the media, she said," according to the Record Searchlight. "In addition to the full-time staff that work in the elections office, Francescut had recruited about 30 volunteers who would have been paid $100 a day to help with the recount."

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"The elections office had asked Hobbs to pay $8,626 for the first day of the recount," the report added. "The process was expected to continue through Thursday, and would have cost about $2,000 less for each day after Monday, Francescut said."

Democracy Docket noted that Hobbs planned to move forward with an election lawsuit, claiming "[m]any illegal ballots” were cast during the election.

The lawsuit said there were "a multitude of scenarios where the entirety of the elections process has resulted in human mistakes, lack of security, lack of chain of custody, electronic machine errors and intentional human actions that caused illegal ballots to be cast and tabulated, ballots being counted more than once, or ballots being discarded and not counted.”

Hobbs asked the court to "moot" her defeat by Long.

"I am 100% MAGA and America First," Hobbs said in a December statement. "I support hand-counted, fair, and transparent elections. I will fight for the citizens of Shasta County to retain our sovereignty and all of our God-given rights."