'My neighbours are crying because their vote went to Pat Buchanan and they can't stand it'

Florida's colourful Palm Beach County, with its golf greens and blue-rinse hairdos, is at the centre of America's potential electoral crisis, with more than 19,000 ballots disqualified.

Democrat voters among Palm Beach County's large pensioner population said the voting papers they were issued were too confusing, and that many may have voted for arch-conservative presidential candidate Pat Buchanan by mistake. Three people who voted Mr Buchanan by mistake have filed a lawsuit. Officials confirmed unclear punch cards forced them to cancel 19,210 ballots in Palm Beach, a Democratic stronghold.

Vice-President Al Gore won Palm Beach easily, with more than 110,000 votes, but the higher than expected 3,407 votes awarded to Mr Buchanan, the reform party candidate, could have been enough to give the Democrat candidate the White House.

Before a recount was ordered, Mr Gore's Republican rival, George W. Bush, was declared the victor in the state by a margin of just over 1,700 votes. With that victory, Mr Bush almost became the next president of the United States.

Some of the dozens of lawyers that have arrived in Florida representing both parties during the official state-wide recount are homing in on Palm Beach as the protests of Democratic Party members mushroom. Some national Democratic figures have suggested a re-vote may be needed.

Local Democrat Minnie Heimlich said the system of punch holes on the ballot paper was too complicated for many elderly voters. 'My neighbours are crying because their vote went to Pat Buchanan and they can't stand it,' she told Knight Ridder newspapers.

'I'm a grandmother . . . but I'm very alert, I'm wide awake,' she said. 'But some of my contemporaries have slowed up. They wouldn't have known if that hole was for Buchanan.'