hanging chad

hanging chad, a chad—the small piece of a paper produced in punching paper tape or cards—that has not completely detached. When paper ballots are used in elections, hanging chads may lead to voting discrepancies. Hanging chads played a major role in the United States presidential election of 2000, when partially punched ballots that were not read by voting machines led, in part, to calls for a recount in Florida. The manual recounts ordered by the Florida Supreme Court were ultimately ended by the Supreme Court of the United States as a result of the case Bush v. Gore.