A federal judge is giving thousands of Florida voters until this weekend to fix their ballots if they haven't been counted due to mismatched signatures.
U.S. District Judge Mark Walker ruled early Thursday that current Florida law on mail-in ballots places a substantial burden on voters. The ruling comes as Florida is wrapping up a recount in three statewide races.
Walker did not go along with a request from Democrats to count all ballots with mismatched signatures. Instead, he ordered that local election officials give voters until 5 p.m. on Saturday to correct the problem so that their ballots can be counted.
State officials testified in court that nearly 4,000 ballots have already been rejected because local canvassing boards decided the signature that was mailed-in doesn't match the signature on file.
Florida's bumpy recount election reaches a pivotal point Thursday as most counties across the state complete reviews that could determine the next senator and governor in one of America's top political battlegrounds.
Unofficial results in the U.S. Senate race have Republican Gov. Rick Scott ahead of Nelson by 0.14 percentage points, which will almost certainly send it to another recount that will last through the weekend.
