Bush Wins New Mexico By 5,988 Votes...

New Mexico Declares Winner in Presidential Poll

The final piece in the U.S. election puzzle fell into place on Tuesday when New Mexico became the last state to determine a winner in the Nov. 2 presidential poll, saying George W. Bush won the sparsely populated state.

In its official tally released on Tuesday, Republican Bush beat Democratic challenger John Kerry by 5,988 votes, Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron said. The final tally was 376,930 for Bush and 370,942 for Kerry.

"We’re a very polarized state," Giron said.

While most states only took a few hours to count tens of millions of votes to determine the winner in their elections, New Mexico had trouble declaring a winner because the race was so close, officials said.

It took state officials about a month to sort out the winner in 2000, when Democrat Al Gore carried the state by 366 votes — the closest margin in the country. Bush won the presidential election that year.

State officials pledged to do a better job in counting votes in 2004, but Democratic Gov. Bill Richardson said election reform was still needed after it took three weeks to officially declare a winner.

Hours after the official tally was released on Tuesday, Richardson called on state lawmakers to pass a reform bill that would, among other things, process absentee ballots prior to Election Day.

"Although there will be costs associated with these reforms, if we can develop a bipartisan consensus, it would definitely be money well-spent to guarantee New Mexico voters a more efficient election process," Richardson said in a statement.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=politicsNews&storyID=6900432