Key Franken Request On Recount Denied
In a setback for Al Franken's chances in the Minnesota recount, the state canvassing board has just rejected the Franken camp's request that the board review the thousands of rejected absentee ballots and potentially re-admit ballots that might have been excluded because of clerical errors -- keeping any such ballots out of the count for now.
The Franken campaign has argued that most rejected ballots were most likely kept out for good reasons, but also said the board had the authority to undo rejections in cases where the Franken camp says they've documented valid ballots being kept out over administrative errors. But the board ended up agreeing with the Coleman campaign's lawyers, who said the board doesn't have that authority.
That said, the board members were not ruling on the merits of the ballots themselves -- only on whether they themselves were the right people to be ruling on it -- and they also said they expect the question to be litigated in court.
The Franken camp is probably not done with this issue yet, but this decision would definitely make things a lot harder for him to win the Senate race if the recount ended up certifying a Coleman victory sans rejected ballots.
Sigh, if this is decided strictly in court, with Coleman with the lead, he has hand. Starting to wonder if Franken can pull this one out.
November 26, 2008 11:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
I expect the Franken campaign to file for a writ of mandamus preventing the secretary of state from certifying the election until the matter of the absentee ballots is decided in the courts.
November 26, 2008 12:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
Franken's team will probably file a writ of mandate but it's an uphill fight. The decision of the Canvassing Board was unanimous and it included two members of the seven member Minnesota Supreme Court.
November 26, 2008 12:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's irrelevant. All the writ of mandamus would do is to prevent the official certification until after the courts decide the issue. Even the canvassing board agreed that the issue should be heard in court. My point is that Eric's fear of going to court with a certified result for Coleman will almost certainly not come to pass. The Court won't allow the result to be certified until after it makes a decision.
November 26, 2008 12:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't think so. I think that a writ of mandamus is likely to be denied since the Minnesota election scheme seems to contemplate that the secretary of state certify a winner based on the recount (which the Canvassing Board, including two Supreme Court justices, just ruled does not include challenges to improperly rejected absentee ballots). Once that is done, a senator can be seated subject to later court challenges to absentee rejections and a later court decision setting aside the certification. If a writ is granted, the result would almost assuredly be that no Minnesota senator is seated when the Senate convenes in January since the court challenges to rejected absentee ballots would likely take longer than January to conclude.
November 26, 2008 12:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Franken's chances of winning are now extremely low. With 82% of the vote counted, his campaign says the 215 deficit has been reduced to 84. He now has to erase the 84 vote deficit in the remaining 18% votes which seems highly, highly unlikely. (We won't get any further major updates on the recount until next week) His only other chance is (1) to find significant amount of "lost" votes and then hope that they break in his favor - even if he finds such lost votes, there's no real reason to think they will break significantly in his favor or (2) to file a lawsuit over the improper rejection of absentee ballots but this will take time (and even then, he will have to find a signficant number of improper rejections - his campaign concedes that the overwhelming percentage of the rejections were proper- and then hope that the improperly rejected ballots break in his favor. Unlikely scenarios
November 26, 2008 12:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think you're forgetting all the "disputed" ballots (or whatever they're called). These are the thousands of ballots that the observers for the two sides have claimed don't show a clear preference for one candidate or the other. There are hints that many of these are silly objections and that most will eventually be counted one way or the other. Which side has been raising the most unjustified objections remains to be seen.
November 26, 2008 12:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
No. Franken's claim of an 84 vote deficit takes into account the challenged ballots. It assumes that all the challenges, both his and that of Coleman, are rejected (as is likely the case). If you don't take into account the challenges, then Coleman's lead is actually about 220.
November 26, 2008 12:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hope still lives in Nate Silver's calculation that Franken is likely to win (albeit very narrowly) by virtue of the likelihood that more of his challenges are "positive" (seeking to add Franken votes that official propose not to count) whereas more of Coleman's are "negative" (seeking to subtract Franken votes that officials propose to count). If challenges are overruled at the same rate for both campaigns, Franken can still win if the positive/negative ratio is significantly different between the camps. But the statements from the Franken camp itself do not inspire great confidence.
November 26, 2008 12:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
I saw Nate Silver's calculations but they haven't been updated in a while so I don't think he stands by them any more. By his analysis, the deficit by now should be much lower than 84. I hope my "calculations" are wrong but it just isn't looking good for Franken right now
November 26, 2008 12:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
From what I can tell the remaining uncounted ballots are from Ramsey and Hennipin Counties. (Minneapolis and St. Paul.) Both went big for Franken. The outstate, already counted, counties pretty much all went for Coleman. While it may be unlikely that he can pick up 84 votes, if he can do it, this is where its going to happen.
November 26, 2008 12:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
If you go to the Star-Tribune site, you'll see that there are a number of counties that haven't started the recount - they start next week- and that all but one of those went for Coleman. (Henk, you're probably looking at the npr site which doesn't include counties where the recount hasn't started). And most of Ramsey and Hennipen have already been counted. This doesn't mean much - one way of looking at it is that there are more Coleman votes to challenge - but its not the case that the outstate counties have all been counted.
November 26, 2008 12:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
OT, interesting take on the '04 FEC decision not to turn the internet into a regulatory morass: http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/Politics/story?id=6334644&page=1
November 26, 2008 12:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
OT#2: Is everyone else being logged out at the whim of the TPM server? It keeps saying that I'm logged out, then logged on, and then I reload and I'm out again.
November 26, 2008 12:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
No. Comments have worked so well today that it's scaring me.
;)
November 26, 2008 12:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
Maybe it's a Google Chrome issue then. Mozilla seems to have been more stable, at least on my computer.
November 26, 2008 1:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
There've been other major Senate developments over the past few days as well that are already shaping up the 2010 midterms: A top Republican challenger to Sen. Harry Reid looks like he will be indicted, and Arlen Specter already leads Chris Matthews by double digits. (Full details here.)
November 26, 2008 1:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
What is the vote count right now?
November 26, 2008 1:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
The Star Tribune shows a 243 lead for Coleman but that is irrelevant because Coleman has challenged somewhat more ballots than Franken (and challenged ballots aren't included in the current totals). Franken hasn't changed their 84 vote deficit statement of yesterday (and very few votes have been counted since yesterday). There will be some more votes counted today and the Star Tribune will have an update by 5 pm EST today. Then there won't be any new figures until Monday.
November 26, 2008 1:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
From the AP:
"The board gave Franken a glimmer of hope after voting his motion down. Members agreed to seek legal advice and meet again soon to decide whether local election officials should sort through the rejected ballots. That would help determine whether any that were actually accepted didn't get counted and whether any rejections fell outside the rules for disqualification. But the board didn't answer what would happen with those ballots."
In other words, the board itself won't do as Franken asked and review the rejected absentees, but they left the door open for local election judges to do so. This issue could still be resolved within the recount process, although it is looking less likely.
November 26, 2008 1:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
It is not looking good for our 60-vote filibuster-proof majority. Martin is behind & Franken may well lose; plus--and most galling--one of the 60 would be the perfidious Lie-berman, who should have been kicked out of the caucus rather than be permitted to have control of the Homeland Security committee, where he will obstruct everything Obama wishes to try in foreign policy. This being so:
WHY DON'T WE KILL THE FILIBUSTER ONCE AND FOR ALL? As I understand it, the chance to do this is when the Senate first convenes next year & sets the rules. We need to begin NOW to pressure them to get rid of teh anti-democratic, thief-protecting anachronism. Or we'll never see national health or an end to the Iraq/Afghanistan misadventure, not to mention real economic change. NUKE THE FILIBUSTER!
November 26, 2008 1:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
NO! The filibuster is a very valuable tool of democratic process. The Senate filibuster is one of the few ways for just a few, or individual voices to be heard and heeded in the Congress.
I'll agree with you that the AUTOMATIC FILIBUSTER, in which one side only has to threaten a filibuster and no bill makes it to the floor, has GOT to go. That's just stupid! Simple majority votes should always win the day with the exception of those, important questions which constitutionally, or by established precedent, requires a supermajority of 67 votes to pass.
There is no way in HELL it should be necessary to get 60 votes pass legislation. No way! If the Republics want to filibuster, MAKE THEM by requiring one of them to be at the podium, speaking, for the entire time of the so-called filibuster. Senate business should be suspended and the protesting parties should get very hoarse, tired and dehydrated as the proper price to pay for what should be a relatively rare and desperate privilege.
THAT is the kind of idiotic accommodation which should be eliminated at the beginning of the 111th Congress. How come Democrats were so unable to block legislation when they "enjoyed" in a razor-thin minority? Where was our automatic "filibuster" then?
Harry Reid MUST GO!!!!! He is despicably incapable and inadequate to lead even a Boy Scout troop, let alone the Senate.
November 26, 2008 1:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
What, exactly, does the filibuster do other than permit a minority--usually corporatists pursuing antidemocratic goals--to obstruct the will of teh majority? A history of the filibuster has shown that it is overwhelmingly used to stop needed change that would threaten to diminish the power of the ruling elite. If we are about democracy we should trust democracy. And now, of all times, when the poison-fuel economy threatens life as we know it; when 50 million of us are doing without health insurance; when foreign wars threaten to bankrupt us; and when the actions of the corporatists threaten to precipitate a Great Depression, or worse--can we really afford to keep this monstrosity? As for minority voices: The filibuster never helped true minorities, just the ultra-rich "minority" that have had their thieving way for too long. Sorry, but I don't agree. The filibuster needs to be killed and a stake driven through its heart once and for all. Otherwise the status quo will continue just when we can afford it least.
November 26, 2008 2:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
The 60 vote goal has always been overstated. Every filibuster is going to have to be individually overridden and that means a strict party line vote is unlikely --- there will be some defections by Senators in both parties depending on the specific bill being debated.
November 26, 2008 4:50 PM | Reply | Permalink