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What happened during Florida's mandatory machine recount after the 2000 election?

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U.S. presidential election of 2000 — Bush v. Gore A Florida judge examining a challenged vote at an operations center in Plantation, Florida, during a recount of the state's U.S. presidential election ballots, 2000.

Following the 2000 U.S. presidential election, Florida state law required a mandatory machine recount of all votes cast because the margin of victory between George W. Bush and Al Gore was less than 0.5 percent. At the time, the gap between the candidates appeared to be approximately 0.01 percent.12

This machine recount was completed by November 10, 2000, at which point George W. Bush’s lead stood at 327 votes out of the six million cast.12

The subsequent controversy, which eventually led to the U.S. Supreme Court case Bush v. Gore, centered on the limitations of these machines. The punch card systems used in many counties could not accurately read ballots where the "chad"—the small piece of paper punched out to record a vote—was not completely removed. This resulted in "hanging chads" (partially attached) and "pregnant chads" (dimpled but not pierced), as well as issues with "undervotes" (ballots recording no vote for president) and "overvotes" (ballots recording multiple votes), which prompted intense legal battles over the necessity and legality of subsequent manual recounts.312