Tight House race in Iowa's 2nd congressional district still too close to call

In Iowa, a House race in the state's 2nd Congressional District remains too close call, even after a recount this past weekend of more than 19,000 ballots. 

Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate ordered the recount after the Jasper County auditor informed the state of a "human error" that resulted in the inaccurate count of nearly 600 ballots cast on Election Day.

Initially, a data entry error in the county led to an excess in reporting of votes in Iowa's Mingo precinct. 

The race between Democrat Rita Hart, a former state senator, and current state Sen. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, a Republican, is being called "perhaps the closest race in this country," by Nate Silver's FiveThirtyEight politics.

"The countywide recount didn't make any significant changes," said the Iowa Secretary of State's communications director Kevin Hall. 

At present, Hart leads Miller-Meeks by fewer than 200 votes, or 0.04 percentage points, allowing the campaign for the GOP candidate to request a state-paid recount. 

The race winner will take the seat left open by retiring seven-term Democratic Rep. Dave Loebsack. 

On election night, Miller-Meeks led Hart by a slim margin, but following the adjustment of the error in Jasper, Hart overtook her opponent.

"We do not agree with the Jasper County Auditor and the Secretary of State’s Office that there has been sufficient transparency concerning the machine irregularities and the auditor’s own claims that human error in the tabulation process arose after results were reported," said Miller-Meeks' campaign in a statement earlier this week. 

Hart released a video statement earlier this week saying "the most important thing is that we get this right." 

Jasper and Scott counties are canvassing votes this week. 

No numbers will be finalized until after counties conduct audits and canvasses after the election. At the end of the month, those numbers will be certified on a statewide basis.