McCrory officially requests statewide recount in gubernatorial race

McCrory's campaign said the recount was filed to "meet the original date statutorily specified, although the formal recount will not occur until after the county boards of election certify their results."

"With many outstanding votes yet to be counted for the first time, legal challenges, ballot protests and voter fraud allegations, we must keep open the ability to allow the established recount process to ensure every legal vote is counted properly," Russell Peck, McCrory's campaign manager, said in a statement.

McCrory can legally request a recount because the vote difference between him and Cooper is fewer than 10,000 votes.

Trey Nix, Cooper's campaign manager, quickly responded to McCrory's request, calling it a "last-ditch effort from Gov. McCrory to delay and deny the results of this election.

"We are confident that a recount will do nothing to change the fact that Roy Cooper has won this election," Nix said.

As counting of provisional ballots continues, Cooper's lead had grown from fewer than 5,000 on Election Night to more than 6,150.

McCrory's campaign and others have filed a slew of legal challenges to vote totals in more than 50 of the state's 100 counties.

The protests so far have largely been dismissed by Republican-controlled county elections boards as either factually incorrect or unproven.

In a Tuesday meeting in Raleigh, the State Board of Election told counties to keep counting votes from the Nov. 8 election despite the challenges.

A group of people was gathered outside the Executive Mansion Tuesday night with a message for the governor: "Move on, McCrory."

The event was organized by the Human Rights Campaign, Equality North Carolina and Progress North Carolina Action, all of which are left-leaning groups.

The groups claim McCrory is trying to throw the integrity of the election into question and that challenges to votes across the state are baseless and pointless. Organizers said many of them have been rejected as Cooper's lead over McCrory has grown.

The groups are calling on McCrory to accept the results of the election.

A similar event took place in Charlotte.