You may have never heard of Danilo Augusto Feliciano, but know that he's the man who questioned the report of the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office .
After celebrating Saturday night, Sunday and since, Sheriff Susan Hutson and the City of New Orleans learned that someone many didn't know thought about challenging the election tally. .
Feliciano — AKA Danil Berger, AKA Danilo Ezekiel Faust — walked into the Orleans Parish Clerk of Criminal Court Darren Lombard's office and delivered an official recount request letter along with $2,155 in cold, hard cash.

Clerk of Orleans Parish Criminal District Court Darren Lombard.
I know there are people in Orleans and other parishes who don't have to think about spending $2,000 in a single payment for anything, but there are far more of us who need to make sure the mortgage or rent is paid first.
Feliciano told me the recount money was all he had.
Feliciano has been a registered voter in Orleans Parish since 2012, according to Secretary of State records. He's registered himself as No Party, and he's had a spotty voting record at best. Though he isn't a chronic or regular voter, he does care about his community. He challenged a far-better-funded incumbent congressman in a district where he doesn't live.
Born a Feliciano, he was adopted and became Danil Berger. His mother was abused, so he dropped that name. He has used different names since, including Dan Faust. Only recently did he resume using his birth name.
A Philadelphia high school graduate, he attended Arizona State University for undergraduate and graduate school with lots of math courses. He became an actuary, an Army soldier, a bartender, a strip club deejay on Bourbon Street. These days, he's driving a rental for his Lyft ride-share gig.
He first arrived in New Orleans five days before the New Orleans Saints won the Super Bowl. Great timing, eh? He's loved the city since. Much of the last three years, he's been in Washington, D.C., "fighting in the courts for this city."
What?
Feliciano feels strongly that Louisiana is corrupt, and he adamantly insists that Louisiana is breaking the law because the state doesn't have systems in place to provide individual voters with auditable paper records in accordance with the . There's a lot more to his argument, and that's why he's taking the matter to the U.S. Supreme Court and spent so much time in D.C. the last three years before returning to the city he loves.Â
The truth is that former and the Louisiana Legislature worked through this and our state will move to a total paper ballot system. Voters will mark paper ballots and scan them, making it possible for all votes to be recounted. As of now, only mail-in absentee ballots can be recounted — and that's a small percentage of people who vote. The early voting and Election Day votes are cast on machines that can't be recounted.
That's worth watching as this system moves through the processes to get us to a point that Feliciano cares about most — every vote should count and every vote should be recounted when necessary.
Like some of our most concerned citizens, Feliciano has a cause and he's willing to fight — and pay — for it. I wish more citizens cared as much as he does.
I just wish that somewhere close to 20% of the Sheriff's Office budget hadn't been at stake.
Feliciano's requested recount happened, resulting in a four-vote victory for the Sheriff's Office. Then, something weird happened. After the recount, Orleans Parish Clerk of Criminal Court Darren Lombard, New Orleans' , learned about a couple of missing military absentee ballots. He told me they had been put in the wrong place and had not been counted. He immediately called the attorney general and secretary of state offices. He was advised to call another recount meeting Friday. During that meeting, the new recount — including the two military ballots — resulted in 12,715 yes votes and 12,713 no votes, the original tally and a two-vote margin of victory.
If the recount had resulted in changing a yes victory into a no win, the New Orleans City Council would have faced a tougher fall budget season as they decide which city programs and services must be cut to fulfill the city's responsibility to fund the office and the city jail. With the Orleans Parish School Board funding an ongoing issue and many other city needs, that wouldn't have been fun.
Feliciano made his point with this recount. We all want voting integrity, and that should include being able to account for each and every vote.