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WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) --
Under the watchful eye of law enforcement authorities, a truck carrying over 450,000 Palm Beach County presidential election ballots set out Thursday for the state capital.
Shortly after an armed sheriff's department deputy secured the rear, sliding door on a yellow Ryder truck, the driver pulled it onto the highway for the 450-mile trek to Tallahassee. Several reporters, passersby and motorists witnessed the departure.
The truck was escorted by law enforcement vehicles -- and its journey along the Ronald Reagan Turnpike was covered live for America by television news channels providing aerial photographs. It was the latest spectacle in a more than three-week-long odyssey of electoral stalemate. No one could say whether it would help settle the issue that has hung over Vice President Al Gore and Texas Gov. George W. Bush since Election Day.
A traffic tieup almost immediately slowed the truck to a crawl -- providing a jarring dose of reality to this surreal mission.
"I think the ballots are going to be like the O.J. Bronco ride," deadpanned Democratic lawyer Dennis Newman, in advance of the trip.
It has been 22 days since voters here cried foul over a confusing "butterfly ballot" many say caused them to cast a vote for Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan instead of Vice President Al Gore.
The trip to Tallahassee was the result of a request by the Gore campaign to have every single vote counted. Some 462,000 ballots were packed into hard metal containers for the ride north.
Voices raised in Palm Beach County were the beginning of a seemingly endless battle that has resulted in seemingly endless court fights and the recounting, again and again, of ballots that will, barring any road trip complications, land the controversial voting cards in Leon County Judge N. Sanders Sauls' courtroom.
Before reaching Sauls, the ballots were to travel northward from the mostly Democratic east coast past Disney World, and up to Interstate 10, where they were to cross the Suwanee River into Florida's largely Republican Panhandle.
Sauls planned to look at the ballots to determine whether Palm Beach County's canvassing board used the correct standard in determining voter intent, including the determination of whether dimpled chads counted as votes.
The transfer of the ballots comes at Gore's request. Democrats hoped that enough votes could be gleaned to surpass the official Bush lead of 537 votes and give Gore Florida's decisive 25 electoral vote.
But there's no clear winner yet.
Republicans on Wednesday questioned whether chads still intact on the ballots could withstand the bumps and curves of the highway, saying the trip would further compromise the integrity of the ballots.
The ballots were scheduled to be transferred from the Palm Beach County Emergency Operations Center, where the manual recount occurred. Unmarked Palm Beach County sheriff's cars were to lead and tail the truck. Democratic and Republican observers were to go along for the eight-hour or longer ride.
