English

Noun

hanging chad ‎(plural hanging chads)

1. A piece of punch-through paper on a voting ballot that has not fully detached from the card-stock.
   • 2000 November 14, “Presidency Hinges on Chad”, in ABC News:

     The Gore campaign hopes there are enough ballots with unattached or “hanging” chads next to Gore’s name to give him the lead in Florida — and with it, the presidency.

   • 2002, Prisoners as Citizens: Human Rights in Australian Prisons, page 308:

     They were introduced to the mysteries of the 'hanging chad' and left wondering at the absence of both a federal electoral agency and a uniform ballot paper and the fact that the electoral processes in the vital State of Florida appeared to be in the partisan hands of a brother of one of the two candidates.

   • 2006, Man of the Year, 01:44:42 from the start:

     But, I mean, for me here's the basic thing. How plausible is it that a woman would fix an election because she's obsessed with me? I mean, where's the hanging chad?

   • 2014, Jordan Ellenberg, How Not to Be Wrong: The Power of Mathematical Thinking, page 401:

     Even that number, of course, is open to argument: How do we count a partially punched ballot, the so-called hanging chad?