Word: courting
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...signs are that it's got even further to go. On Friday, Minnesota's highest court refused Franken's request that Governor Tim Pawlenty and secretary of state Mark Ritchie be forced to award him the coveted election certificate, which, according to Senate rules, is necessary to seat a candidate. The ruling virtually ensures that the legal wrangling will continue for several more weeks and - if Coleman chooses to appeal the case, possibly to federal courts - perhaps even months...
...officials improperly rejected. But a mid-February order from the panel severely limited the categories of absentee ballots it would consider - and, in the process, dealt a serious blow to Coleman's chances of winning the contest. When Coleman rested his case last Monday, he was arguing for the court to examine fewer than 2,000 absentee ballots. In his closing argument, Coleman's attorney Jim Langdon argued the election was so rife with error that the panel might not be able to declare a winner...
Franken's counsel thought otherwise. On Friday, the panel heard arguments about a request from Franken to dismiss the case altogether because, they argued, Coleman failed to prove that there were enough improperly rejected ballots to close Franken's 225-vote margin. The court is expected to rule on that motion soon. In the meantime, Franken's team has been trying to prove that flaws in the state's election system were the exception, not the rule. He is also attempting to get about 800 absentee ballots tossed into the final tally, most of which are from counties...
Election-law experts say that Coleman has been laying the groundwork for an appeal ever since that mid-February ruling. Indeed, it's not rare these days to hear Coleman's attorneys claim the ruling violated the equal-protections clause of the U.S. Constitution. "The court has given him very narrow opportunity for establishing proof or establishing evidence as to what ballots are going be counted," notes David Schultz, a professor at Hamline University and the University of Minnesota who is an expert in election law. "It still leaves the court with what looks like an inconsistency. But that...
...frustrated as they appear to be with the court case, Minnesotans aren't all desperate to have someone go to Washington right away. A recent Rasmussen poll of 500 Minnesotans found that about 46% supported conducting another election altogether. "I think that since this issue landed in front of a panel of three judges, it has become increasingly clumsy," says James Crockarell, a Coleman voter. "The election is now in the hands of the court and out of the hands of the people. The fairest thing that speaks to the people is to have a new election...