Franken Camp's Claim: We've Cut Coleman's Lead To Under 100 Votes

[dkf]

By Eric Kleefeld - November 21, 2008, 2:10PM

Has Al Franken cut Norm Coleman's lead down to double digits? That's what the Franken campaign just claimed in a briefing with reporters.

The current estimates from the Star Tribune have Coleman up by about 130 votes, but the Franken campaign claims the true difference is much less than that when you take into account disputed ballots that aren't included right now in the totals but are likely to be resolved pretty easily by the state canvassing board.

Even if a challenged ballot is taken out of the total recount pool for the time being, the Franken campaign thinks it has an idea of what the numbers will eventually look like based on the opinions of the election workers at the individual sites -- and they think the real Coleman lead right now is less than 100 votes, instead of the current common estimate of over 130.

Franken's lead recount lawyer Marc Elias also pointed out that with 51.1% of the ballots recounted so far, the portion that has been counted were from disproportionately Republican areas -- so the remaining votes could end up having even more error-corrections that boost Franken than we've seen already.

http://tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/11/franken_camps_claim_weve_cut_c.php

[opihimoimoi]

1. Promising news is better than Depressing news....GO AL GO...

:toast:

[madrchsod]

2. will this come down to one vote or a tie?

i guess that stupid movie is`t so far fetched after all....

[Edweird]

3. Man, this is like that one-in-a-million pool shot where the ball is creeping toward the pocket....

Will it sink or will it stop at the edge....

[dkf]

5. It is crazy how close this is.

And the waiting is agonizing.

[cobalt1999]

4. I think he's going to take it.

If the republican areas have already been recounted and the lead has decreased, then it's looking good.

[Touchdown]

6. Does that include the "Lizard People" voter?

Heard about that one on Randi's show.:rofl: