The Democratic incumbents in two close Virginia House of Delegates elections filed court petitions for recounts in their races Wednesday, leaving open the possibility of a 50-50 split in that chamber if their efforts are successful.

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       Dels. Martha M. Mugler (D-Hampton) and Alex Askew (D-Virginia Beach) were narrowly behind in their elections when officials certified the results of the statewide races Monday, setting up a new 52-48 Republican majority in the House to go with the GOP’s victories in all three executive branch offices.

       Mugler trailed Republican A.C. Cordoza by 94 votes, or 0.33 percentage points, and Askew was 127 votes behind Republican Karen S. Greenhalgh, or 0.44 points.

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       Both margins fall below the 0.5-percentage-point state threshold for recounts granted by a circuit court judge to be funded by the state.

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       Mugler said she was moved to pursue a recount after learning about errors in the vote count in some precincts, including one where the total number of votes for Cordoza was transposed — from 676 to 767 — before that error was corrected.

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       “I trust the process and will rely on the methods put in place to uphold fair elections in the Commonwealth,” Mugler said in a statement.

       In the same statement, Askew said he wanted to make sure that every legitimate vote is counted “and properly accounted for.”

       A spokesman for Republican House Minority Leader Todd Gilbert (R-Shenandoah), who has been chosen by his party’s caucus to be the next House speaker, reiterated that his office is confident the GOP has a 52-48 majority.

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       Christopher E. Piper, the state elections commissioner, appears to agree.

       Last week, he told a Richmond civic group that the size of the vote margins in both races were too large for a recount to make a difference.

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       Under state laws governing recounts in Virginia, the losing candidates will be allowed to examine poll books and other materials used in the election for any signs of error.

       The actual recounts will be conducted by local election officials in each House district. The officials will feed the ballots into voting machines programmed to find write-in ballots, ballots that can’t be read and instances of overvoting and undervoting on a given ballot.

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       Those ballots will be set aside and hand counted, along with the ballots that were hand counted on Election Day.

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       Court-appointed recount officials may challenge ballots if their validity appears in doubt or if they can’t agree on the voter’s intent.

       A three-judge “recount court” will make a determination on each challenge.

       An individual voter’s eligibility to cast a ballot, including those who filled out provisional ballots that were counted for the election, is not part of the recount process, state election officials say.

       When the recount is finished, the results will be certified by the recount court.

       Exit polls from the 2021 Virginia gubernatorial election

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