Posted: December 30, 2008

MN Senate race: Franken up by 50 votes unofficially

The Minnesota state canvassing board met today to review 2 dozen ballots whose allocation on the board’s spreadsheet differed from how the campaigns thought they should have been allocated. The board disposed of these quickly with Coleman gaining two votes and Franken gaining six votes for an unofficial Franken lead of 50 votes. Next, the board will meet on Jan. 5 to determine which wrongly-rejected absentee ballots should be counted. The campaigns are having trouble agreeing on which of these ballots should be counted. Franken wants all 1,346 ballots identified by the counties as wrongly rejected to be counted. The Coleman campaign has agreed to over 700 of these and has asked that an additional 600+ rejected absentee ballots be reviewed again for possible inclusion as well. The Coleman campaign says it suspects that there has been inconsistency across counties in the decisions to include absentee ballots. Regional meetings are planned throughout Minnesota for the counties and the campaigns to attempt to come to agreement on which absentee ballots ought to be included in the state canvass.