Vote Count In Davis-Tomlinson Senate Race Continues

BENSALEM, PA — Three days after Election Day, the arduous task of counting every vote in a tight state senate race in Lower Bucks County continued.

Shortly after midnight on Tuesday, it appeared that Democratic state Rep. Tina Davis had fallen exactly 100 votes short in her effort to unseat longtime incumbent Republican Sen. Tommy Tomlinson in the District 6 race.

The unofficial vote total from the Bucks County Board of Elections was 54,319 to 54,219.

Tomlinson has publicly declared victory. But the Davis campaign is working to make sure absentee ballots, overseas and military ballots and provision votes are counted to see if they'll offset Tomlinson's razor-thin margin of victory.

And they might not be done for a while.

On Friday, election officials began the work of certifying the elections results. Representatives of both campaigns were on hand at county offices, challenging ballots that were ruled unusable, questioning the performance of voting machines and the like.

Aren Platt, a spokesman for the Davis campaign, called the work "slow going" and said that campaign staffers expect to be back at it on Tuesday. Monday is Veterans Day and county offices are closed.

Once a vote total is certified, Davis will certainly be allowed by law to request a recount. Pennsylvania law allows a recount to be requested if a race is settled by less than half a percentage point and the 100-vote margin isn't even one-tenth of a point.

But observers who have followed the race closely say that, considering the automated nature of the voting machines used in Bucks County, the real work in this case will be done before the race comes down to a recount, which would be largely a formality.

Davis, as is allowed by Pennsylvania law, also was seeking re-election to her House seat while seeking to knock off Tomlinson. She won that race handily, defeating Republican Anthony Sposato, 13,332 to 8,131.

Davis, 58, hails from Bristol Township, while Tomlinson, 72, is from Bensalem.

While Tomlinson, who has represented the district since 1995, had the advantage of incumbency, the numbers shaped up well for Davis in the district, where registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans by roughly 17,000, according to the Bucks County Board of Elections.

Before being elected to the Senate, Tomlinson was a member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives serving the 18th District from 1991-94. Before that, he was director of the Bensalem Township School District from 1978 to 1990. He owns and operates Tomlinson Funeral Home in Bensalem.

Serving her third term in the House, Davis previously served on the Bristol Township Council. A former real estate agent, she has championed issues including cracking down on public officials taking money in exchange for services and a bill establishing legal penalties for "revenge porn." She co-owns a local trucking company with her husband, Jim.

Photos courtesy Davis, Tomlinson campaigns