x
Breaking News
More () »

"Nobody," cartoons lead ATL write-ins

Fulton County elections office held a recount Saturday in an Atlanta city council race.
the Mouse

The Fulton County elections board was expected to certify the vote in the Post 1 city council race Saturday, making incumbent councilman Michael Julian Bond the winner.

Fulton County held a recount Saturday. Bond’s opponent, Courtney English, had been pondering a lawsuit because the elections director threw out hundreds of write in votes. If kept, they would have denied bond a majority and forced a runoff.

Bond received 37,575 votes, and English finished with 36,113. Those numbers will be added to DeKalb's results to determine the final results.

RELATED | Mass confusion reigns in Atlanta city council race

11Alive News has acquired a list of the write-in votes , which showed a tendency of voters to express frustration with listed candidates and a desire, perhaps, to poke fun at the process.

Fulton County provided a list of nearly 6,000 write-in votes cast November 7 in Atlanta's election.

Atlanta rapper Killer Mike got dozens of write-in votes. There were also votes for actor Donald Glover, athletes Colin Kaepernick and John Smoltz. The votes didn’t actually count in the recount conducted Friday, but they turned up on a list released to 11Alive News.

"The (write-in) votes essentially don’t count. So if you do do a write in for say Donald Duck, essentially, yeah, your vote isn’t going to count. Unless Donald Duck comes down and certifies" by filling out the necessary paperwork prior to the election," said Rick Bannon, Fulton's election director.

Donald Duck got more than a dozen uncounted votes. There were also votes for Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Batman and Butthead. But Mickey Mouse was a leading vote getter among Atlantans who ended up throwing away their votes. In Bond’s race, hundreds of write-in votes threatened to force a runoff.

"People are free to vote, but they’re also free to throw away their vote. And that’s in part kind of what has happened in this case," Bond said Friday.

Many write-in voters tried to make political statements in the process. “Stop overdevelopment” was a theme that won some uncounted write-in votes. But voters most persistently sent apathetic messages about the candidates they saw on ballots.

“Anyone else” got a lot of votes. So did “none of the above.” A handful expressed the same sentiment by writing in “dogcatcher” or “Darth Vader” or “Deez Nuts.”

"I think we need to take our right to vote a little more seriously than that," Bond said. Yet Bond says he, too, cast an uncertified write in vote. He wouldn't say in which race, but said it was for "anybody but." He did it as a protest—joining hundreds of other ballot box lamentations.

Before You Leave, Check This Out