Kleefeld @ TPM re: Coleman & Sheehan v Franken (w/ link to pdf of 204pp Notice of Contest)

[struggle4progress]

Coleman's Lawsuit: This Whole Election Stinks -- And I Won
By Eric Kleefeld - January 7, 2009, 6:16PM

I've been reading through the lawsuit <pdf> that Norm Coleman has filed against the result of the Minnesota Senate race, and it's a marvelous thing.

The complaint ignores the existence of counter-evidence, employs one maneuver when it is self-benefiting and opposes the same maneuver when it goes against them, attacks not just the recount but votes that were counted for Franken all along, and overall throws everything against the wall to see what sticks ...

Coleman wants to re-litigate the awarding of disputed ballots by the canvassing board weeks ago, re-challenging ballots that were awarded to Al Franken, plus ballots that were not awarded to him ...

Coleman claims that multiple precincts had "more votes than voters," a potential irregularity if we understand that as being more ballots than people who signed in on the register. But Coleman has another definition: When the votes tallied in the recount were more than were counted on Election Night, with no reference to what was on the voter register. The whole point of a recount is to find votes that the machines failed to pick up at first ...

Coleman says those Election Night numbers were bad, too, and wants even more votes for Franken thrown out from absentee ballots that he claims should never have been counted, based on errors on the envelopes. But the envelopes were separated from the enclosed ballots months ago, and he can't prove whom these people voted for. He just wants to throw out Franken votes by fiat ...

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