Coleman loses another... argument gets weaker

Coleman's chances of winning the election are surely next to nothing. After the three judge panel decided to open as many as 1500 ballots to see if the proper registration was in the wrong envelope. Turns out out of all 1500 hundred ballots..only nearly 90 were actually admissible. Its not sure how many votes Coleman or Franken will net out of this, but one thing that is definitely true is that: 90 < 225. That shows how even at the end of the trial, Coleman is trying to make desperate attempts to get votes. The math just doesn't add up. If Coleman had 226 ballots to show the Judge Panel, he would have already. At this point it just looks like obstruction. If the campaign had any real argument, they wouldn't be caught so many times without comment....like with this latest Star Tribune report

"After the Secretary of State identified the 89 as containing valid registration forms, Franken lawyer Marc Elias said the number was well below the threshold that "might have opened up" the contest. The Coleman campaign did not have an immediate comment."

Franken increases lead, barely

Franken picked up 24 votes today. The panel heard testimony from Franken supporters (61) and decided to grant some of them votes.

Read here

Coleman - absentee ballots are a long shot

Basically what it comes down to is that Coleman is looking to overturn the
slim lead by Franken by introducing ballots that come from skewed areas. He doesn't want to consider that there are ballots from Franken leading areas that were miscounted or wrongly rejected.


"If the 4,739 ballots Coleman wants the court to consider, 3,015 come from areas that voted for him over Franken in the Nov. 4 election. About a third of the ballots are from areas that gave Coleman more than 55 percent of their votes.

Carver County, which gave Coleman nearly 67 percent of the vote and a more lopsided victory than any other county, contributed 370 of those ballots.

Even in Hennepin County, whose already tabulated votes went nearly 60 percent to Franken, most of the absentee ballots Coleman wants reconsidered come from cities that voted for the Republican.

There are 1,385 Hennepin County ballots on Coleman's list. Just 38 percent of those, or 529 ballots, came from places that preferred Franken to Coleman. Democratic Minneapolis, the state's largest city, contributed 217 ballots to the list.

Most of the Hennepin County ballots on the list, 856 of them, come from Republican-leaning areas within the Democratic county. Plymouth, Maple Grove and Eden Prairie, all of which went for Coleman by greater than 55 percent among all counted ballots, contributed 335 ballots to Coleman's list." - Pioneer Press

I believe this is another clue that Franken will win this battle. Coleman's attempts at overturning the results are looking a bit desperate. His attempts also look more and more transparent. His motives are obvious and hopefully the judge panel sees through this attempt.

A little instant analysis: Franken will probably win

A little excerpt on why I Think Franken will win the Election... although it will take a few more weeks (maybe 3?)

radiofiendmusic: 1st there is no precedent for overturning recounts
radiofiendmusic: 2nd the court said that Coleman would have to subpoena all of the 87 counties absentee ballots
radiofiendmusic: 3rd Coleman's arguments have been largely inconsistent through out the entire process

Totally Expected News: Franken Got the Boot

"Al Franken’s trial balloon argument that he should soon be seated in the Senate – at least on a provisional basis -- isn’t going very far.

Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R-Minn.) and Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie, a Democrat, reiterated that no election certificate will be handed out until the post-recount legal activity is complete. Both issued separate statements to that effect this afternoon.

“Minnesota law is very clear on when a certificate of election can be issued. Neither the governor nor I may sign a certificate of election in the U.S. Senate race until all election contests have reached a final determination,” said Ritchie. “Even if the governor issues a certificate of election prior to the conclusion of the contest phase, I will not sign it.”

Added Pawlenty: “I have a duty to follow state law and our statutes are clear on this issue. I am prohibited from issuing a certificate of election until the election contest in the courts has been resolved.”" -Politico


My Analysis:
So its clear, because Coleman has contested the election and even with his political future at stake Minnesota will only have 1 Senator for several weeks or months. Minnesotans won't be happy with 99 Senators. When Roland Burris gets sworn in later this week, we will be the only State without full representation. Klobuchar is a good Senator to handle the extra services. I see very little chance of Coleman actually winning the seat, so I say bring it on! The fallout on his political future is almost certain. Hes hammering the nails in his own coffin. If the court challenge is what it takes for Coleman to go away, then sure I'll be patient.

Coleman to Contest Election

After listening to the coverage on MPR

I see that Coleman has decided to contest the election. Although this is completely in his right (up to 7 days after canvas board certification) this doesn't seem to be a very good political move. His chances of overturning the decisions in his favor are pretty small and even if he gets both decisions in his favor, he wold have a large deficit to over come. having votes be in his favor 2 to 1. There is not much room to gain those votes.
It will be very hard for him to win this election, and even harder for him to serve again without skepticism. It will be good to see what the lawsuit decisions to do the race, but frankly from what I have heard Minnesotans are sick of this race and want a quick conclusion to it. If Coleman decides to draw out the seating of Al Franken, it will most certainly be to the decrement of his political future.

News coference at 3 pm: I think that he might cocede

The prospects of Norm winning at this point are next to nothing. I think that there might be a chance he concedes setting up a political future. If he fights this out and still ends up the loser it might shoot down his political future. If he somehow fights and pulls an upset, his new term would be clouded in controversy. So if Norm wants to be a candidate again (ex. Gov 2010), hi best chances of a future are if he concedes today.




Also I stole this piece from the Power Liberal, I thought it was very relevant.

Coleman Locked Out of his Office

"About 20 Coleman staffers had showed up for work at the senator's Washington office today, but they were ordered to close the office around midday by Howard Gantman, staff director for the Senate Rules and Administration committee.

Gantman said that Coleman's staff could NOT carry on Senate business. The senator's term had officially expired on Saturday.

But the senator released a statement indicating that the seemingly clear order might be subject to debate:

"Without question, this is a unique situation in the history of the Senate and specifics are still to be determined as to the future of the Senate office,'' Coleman said in the statement." MinnPost

Coleman has official been locked out of his office because of the Senate Rules. That's satisfying. I hope you all can enjoy this as much as me.

Franken Wins according to Canvas Board and SoS...But more to follow

"Al Franken was declared the winner over Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.) in the Minnesota Senate race, but the Coleman campaign has announced it will be contesting the results in a post-election challenge." says Politico.


My analysis:
-Basically here is how it rolls out. Franken is 225 votes ahead after the recount. That is nearly a 1000 vote swing from election night projections. The recount looks to be transparent conducted by non-partisan county election officials a TRI-partisan canvas board that included 2 Republicans (appointed by Pawlenty) and 2 Independents and only 1 Democrat (SoS Mark Ritchie). There doesn't seem to be a lot of avenues for Coleman to sue. There is a current suit by the Coleman campaign over a contested 654 votes, which neither county auditors, the canvas board or the Franken campaign. In the MN Supreme Court decision earlier, it stated that all concerned parties must agree. The lack of a real decision by the court probably suggests that the suit won't get any real post-election differing results.

Even hypothetically, if Coleman gets the 654 votes included in the recount, and even further sues for the 133 votes that he claims were double counted, the problem is he would still have to net at least 225 votes. If both decisions are in his favor that only leaves 787 votes. Many didn't believe Franken would be up by such a large margin, but he is. This is statistically very difficult. Coleman would have to get 65% of the votes. That is very very dificult.
Chances are he wont get those decisions, and even if he does he would hve to get a very large margin of them. So at this point it looks like Franken is an almost certain winner.

Time to start cheering.