The machine recount currently underway in Florida is a cakewalk compared to what will unfold here in Broward County when the hand recount begins. Machines are currently tabulating every ballot, and the results will remain unknown until Thursday afternoon, when they are transmitted to the Florida secretary of state. That’s when the manual recount will begin—along with the bitter fights over thousands of individual ballots. Broward County is ground zero for the Florida recount in the US Senate race between incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson and Republican Gov.