Waukesha County Gets May 26 Recount Extension

Waukesha County will have until May 26 to finish its hand recount of the state Supreme Court race that sharply divided the state's electorate, a judge has ruled.

Dane County Circuit Judge Richard Niess agreed this morning to extend today's deadline for completion of the historic recount of the race between incumbent Justice David Prosser and challenger JoAnne Kloppenburg.

Waukesha County Corporation Counsel Tom Farley participated in the hearing via telephone conference. The county will check in with the judge at 11:30 a.m. Friday to report its progress.

"Hopefully we will be done sooner" than May 26, said Ellen Nowak, chief of staff for Waukesha County Executive Dan Vrakas.

All counties except Waukesha were expected to finish their recounts by today. Prosser has a margin of victory of about 7,000 votes in his bid to serve another 10-year term on the state's high court.

Waukesha County doubled its number of tabulators starting this morning and moved its operations to the larger cafeteria in the Waukesha County Administration Building to increase the number of election reporting units being processed simultaneously. Nowak said the expanded operation was "going well."

Votes in the Villages of Lisbon and Merton were being recounted this morning. Tomorrow will be the city of Waukesha.

Waukesha County is continuing to livestream its recount. The new camera angle in the move to the cafeteria, however, only shows the head table for the judge, board of canvassers, court reporter and lead campaign representatives, and does not show the tabulation and recount activity.

The recount of the City of Brookfield's votes , and included disputes about , setting up a possible legal challenge to counting those votes.