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Ear to the Ground

Minnesota Recount Stuck in the Mud

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Posted on Dec 29, 2008
AP photo / Dawn Villella

State Election Director Gary Poser, center, representatives for Republican incumbent Norm Coleman and Democrat Al Franken, and other election officials discuss disputed ballots to wrap up the first phase of the Senate recount way back on Dec. 5 in Buffalo, Minn.

Minnesotans have been parodied for their politeness, but the state’s Senate race seems to get nastier and nastier. With Al Franken taking a sliver of a lead by most estimates, the bitter recount battle halted Monday as both sides made a scene in Secretary of State Mark Ritchie’s office.

Franken has won a number of key legal skirmishes, and now Norm Coleman’s camp appears to be stalling while it searches for a viable route back to the Senate.


Minneapolis Star Tribune:

With a Minnesota Supreme Court-imposed deadline approaching and the sniping among lawyers increasing, the U.S. Senate recount stalled today as the campaigns for Sen. Norm Coleman and Democrat Al Franken remained far apart on an agreement on improperly rejected absentee ballots.

Lawyers for the two campaigns publicly bickered this morning at a meeting held by Secretary of State Mark Ritchie’s office, with the Franken campaign saying Coleman did little over the weekend to help reach an agreement over how many of the disputed ballots should be counted. While the Franken campaign said Saturday it wanted to count all 1,346 absentee ballots that local officials have determined were improperly rejected, lawyers for Coleman said today they had agreed to 136 of the ballots but would release a list containing “lots, lots more” later today.

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By Old Geezer Pilot, December 30, 2008 at 6:58 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

“...Luckily, Minnesota’s electoral law has a provision for ties. After all the counting and recounting, if the vote is statistically tied, the state should invoke the section of the law that requires the victor to be chosen by lot. It’s hard to swallow, but the right way to end the senatorial race between Mr. Coleman and Mr. Franken will be to flip a coin…”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/04/opinion/04seife.html?n=Top/Reference/Times Topics/People/F/Franken, Al

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By al, December 30, 2008 at 11:54 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

Minnesota is taking lessons for Chicago now. “HOW TO VOTE MORE THAN ONCE”

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By mill, December 29, 2008 at 7:11 pm Link to this comment

the headline “Minnesota Recount Stuck in the Mud” is not true.

the recount is proceeding in an orderly, transparent way.  deadline for resolving campaign disputes over which absentee ballots is Friday.  there are a lot of people working hard to get it right in Mn, across the political spectrum.

the only mud results when one campaign just has to fling some at the other campaign for what ever reason, and even that has been pretty restrained

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