After all the shenanigans that were being reported out of Florida’s Broward County, current Governor and should be Senator-elect Rick Scott announced that he was going to sue both Broward and Palm Beach counties to ensure that there would be no voter fraud.

In their lawsuit against Broward County, Scott and the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) allege that officials there are hiding critical information about the number of votes cast and counted. And in a parallel suit against Palm Beach County, Scott and the NRSC charge that the election supervisor there illegally used her own judgment to determine voter intent when reviewing damaged or incorrectly filled-out absentee ballots, while refusing to allow impartial witnesses to monitor the process.

“I will not stand idly by while unethical liberals try to steal an election,” Scott, who is currently Florida’s governor, said at a press conference outside the Governor’s Mansion, as he slammed potential “rampant fraud” in the race.

The bombshell litigation comes hours after Florida GOP Sen. Marco Rubio, in an extraordinary series of tweets that alleged incompetence if not outright complicity by Florida officials, charged that Democratic lawyers were “descending on” the state in a calculated attempt to “change the results” and “try and steal” several statewide races.

“Late Tuesday night, our win was projected to be around 57,000 votes,” Scott told reporters. “By Wednesday morning, that lead dropped to 38,000. By Wednesday evening, it was around 30,000. This morning, it was around 21,000. Now, it is 15,000.”

He continued: “On election night, Broward County said there were 634,000 votes cast. At 1 a.m. today, there were 695,700 ballots cast on election day. At 2:30 p.m. today, the number was up to 707,223 ballots cast on Election Day. And we just learned, that the number has increased to 712,840 ballots cast on Election Day. In Palm Beach County, there are 15,000 new votes found since election night.

“So, it has been over 48 hours since the polls closed and Broward and Palm Beach Counties are still finding and counting ballots – and the Supervisors – Brenda Snipes and Susan Bucher – cannot seem to say how many ballots still exist or where these ballots came from, or where they have been,” Scott said.

And it’s not just this race. Broward County Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes has had problems over MULTIPLE elections.

Broward County Supervisor of Elections, Brenda Snipes, has a long history of fraud.

Here are just some headlines from the past few years about misconduct, and outright violation of the law by Brenda Snipes and the “most controversial elections department in South Florida”. pic.twitter.com/oczeHiz2d7

— The Reagan Battalion (@ReaganBattalion) November 9, 2018

And Susan Bucher in Palm Beach County isn’t doing herself any favors.

JUST IN: Facing criticism from Pres. Trump, Sen. Rubio, Gov. Scott and other Republicans, Palm Beach Co. supervisor of elections says it's “unfortunate” that they “are trying to disrupt our democracy because they don’t like the demographics of our voters.” https://t.co/XgxNvfogar pic.twitter.com/CKFLNNseOa

— MSNBC (@MSNBC) November 9, 2018

But guess who agrees with Rick Scott?

Scott's lawsuit prevails. As was abundantly obvious, Broward County is in violation of the law. https://t.co/3Ou9FiEWFs

— Charles C. W. Cooke (@charlescwcooke) November 9, 2018

The judge was pretty clear that there is a procedure in place, and Broward County had better comply.

Scott’s campaign filed a lawsuit demanding that Broward Elections Supervisor Brenda Snipes turn over several records detailing the counting and collection of ballots cast for each day of the past week.

A hearing on the case was held Friday afternoon, where Circuit Judge Carol-Lisa Phillips said there was a violation of Florida’s Constitution and public records act. The judge ordered Snipes to allow inspection of the records on or before 7 p.m. Friday.

Lawyers for Snipes argued that requiring such a swift response would interfere with ongoing efforts to finish counting Broward County ballots. But lawyers for Scott contended the information is already required to be collected under state law and should take minutes to provide.

The information sought includes ballots not yet reviewed by the Canvassing Board, absentee ballots and early voting ballots.

And this is also messing with the governor’s race, where Andrew Gillum decided to “un-concede” and start demanding a recount.

In the governor’s race, Democrat Andrew Gillum’s campaign said Thursday it’s readying for a possible recount. The race has tightened since he conceded to Republican Ron DeSantis on Tuesday night. As of Friday morning, DeSantis led Gillum by 0.47 percentage point.

You’d think Florida, of all places, with its history, would want to avoid even the appearance of fraud or impropriety. Forget it. It’s Broward County.

Here’s hoping against hope that this demand by the judge that the law be followed puts an end to any potential stuffing of the ballot box to swing the vote. But given the fact that Broward County had to be sued to prove the point, I’m not hopeful.

Featured image: Governor Rick Scott (image via screenshot)