At about 11 a.m. Monday morning, Josh McAllister and his family were milling around the foyer of the Winn Parish courthouse. At the same time, Sheriff Cranford Jordan was in his office, carrying on the business of Winn’s top law enforcement officer where he’ll continue his duties for the next seven months.
A recount of mail-in (paper) ballots for the Nov. 18 General Election had been recounted by the Parish Board of Election Supervisors under the watch of two representatives from the Secretary of State’s Office in Baton Rouge. The findings upheld the initial election results: McAllister will become Winn Parish Sheriff in July 2024.
In the recount, McAllister actually picked up one additional vote from a paper ballot that had been classified as an “under vote” (meaning that neither candidate seemed to be indicated when the ballot was scanned). Registrar of Voters Bryan Kelley explained that when this ballot was examined, the board saw that the voter had made a mark to the side but in their opinion had clearly meant to cast the vote for McAllister. The final tally gave the challenger of 17-point edge over the incumbent.
Explaining the process, Kelley said that Jordan had filed papers in a timely manner for the recount of absentee ballots. Two representatives from the Secretary of State’s Office reported to the Registrar’s Office where they met with the Parish Board of Election Supervisors at 10 a.m. “I called the meeting to order and Paul Blanchard from Baton Rouge explained several different ways we could do the recount. We chose to do it by hand. There were 283 paper ballots.
“We then went through the ballots and placed them individually into three stacks, one for those going to Cranford Jordan, one for Josh McAllister and the third for under votes.” He explained that while those in the last stack (there were only 3) may have voted in other races but not for sheriff. For those absentee votes, the final tally was 174 for Jordan and 106 for McAllister, giving the total vote of 2,157 for McAllister and 2,140 for Jordan.
Kelley said that following the recount, the board certified the recount results then went down to the Clerk of Court’s Office and certified the overall election results for Winn. Members of that board are Clerk of Court Chesney Chandler, Registrar of Voters Bryan Kelley, Democratic Party Rep Deano Thornton, Republican Party Rep Carl Bryant and Governor’s Appointee Danny Parker.