FEP 43 Page 37 M: Yes. You have problems that happen anywhere and everywhere, and that's where people are acting honestly in good faith. The old saying in Chicago was, "vote early and vote often." I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about where people are honestly and sincerely trying to follow the law and make sure that everybody gets to vote, things go wrong. P: Well, in this state, with a few exceptions, I don't think there was any massive fraud. Did you discover any fraud at all? M: I'm not aware of any in Volusia County, and I don't recall reading about anything of that nature in any other county in Florida. P: I do know that there were three people who voted six times and things like that, but this was really very unusual. There were some people who were not legally registered who voted and some underage people who voted, but this was not in any way designed to try to change the outcome of the election, so it's not vote fraud per se. Do you think the media was fair to you and to the state of Florida? M: I think the vast majority of people in the news media were very fair to me. In fact, one of the reporters that I talked with after the election said, well you know, everybody liked you, we felt immediately that we could trust you. Of course, the thing is the local news media knew me, the Daytona Beach News-Journal and the Orlando Sentinel, and they did the best job reporting because they knew all the players. So, to what extent people like CNN and The New York Times and Wall Street Journal might have talked to local news people who knew me and knew about me, I have no way of knowing that, but I think that with very few exceptions, the national and international news media were very fair to me. P: But they were pretty harsh on Florida. You know, "Flori-duh," the state that doesn't know how to count. That sort of thing. M: Well, you look at the circus that they had in Miami-Dade County. You look at the circus they had in Palm Beach County. And, quite frankly, you look at the circus in Broward County. I remember, I guess it was the day after Thanksgiving, I was watching CNN, and the judge who was the chair of that canvassing board said, well, we just wrapped things up. Then he said, my view is, if somebody voted straight Democratic on all the other races, it was the intent of that voter to vote for Al Gore. I remember, I yelled back at the television, I said, you cannot do that. Your duty under the statute is to ascertain the intent of the voter in that one race, in the President of the United States. Somebody can say I'm voting for straight Democratic for all these other races; however, for president I'm voting for the Republican candidate, or I'm voting for one of the other minority candidates. 37