NOW it's official - Frank Kratovil wins MD-01

We can stop worrying about initial election day returns, the difference between AB1 and AB2 counts, and what qualifies a provisional ballot to be counted. All the counting is done, there's no more counting to do, and ladies and gentlemen, it's official:

Frank Kratovil (D) has won MD-01.

By a final, seriously- we-really-mean-it-this-time count of 177,065 to 174,213 Frank Kratovil has officially and completely won the race. 

A few last details I think are interesting, anyway. From the time we first got totals on Tuesday night until the AB1, Provisional and AB2 counts were completed, Frank Kratovil gained 16,151 votes while Andy Harris gained only 14,215.

So while he started out with a lead of just 916 on last Tuesday night, he ended up with a lead of 2,852. In just 30,000 or so post-Election Day votes counted, Frank added another 1,600 or so votes to his lead. That's almost a 10% difference in votes garnered for the candidates in a race that was deadlocked on Election Night. 

That's a 55/45 split in late-counted voted, the overwhelming majority of which were absentee. And absentee votes totals are almost never good news for Democrats. And the requests were split almost exactly evenly by party affiliation.

Maybe it's just a weird statistical fluke. But it does show the lengths to which some Republicans chose to go to show their displeasure with Andy Harris, and their support of Frank Kratovil.