Spokesman says Coleman will appeal ruling, probably next week

Ben Ginsberg said he's confident the state Supreme Court will take seriously the campaign's argument that many Minnesotans were wrongly denied their votes.

By KEVIN DUCHSCHERE, Star Tribune

Last update: April 15, 2009 - 11:28 AM

Norm Coleman will appeal the court decision awarding the U.S. Senate election to Al Franken, Coleman's chief legal spokesman said Tuesday.

Ben Ginsberg said the appeal to the Minnesota Supreme Court probably will be filed next week, to give the Coleman campaign's lawyers a chance to fully digest the 68-page opinion that the three-judge panel handed down late Monday afternoon.

Coleman has 10 days to file the appeal.

The judges dismissed Coleman's argument that systemic errors in the election process invalidated Franken's razor-thin lead and required the counting of some 4,400 additional absentee ballots that had been rejected.

Most of those votes, Ginsberg said, came from precincts that Coleman won and therefore could overturn Franken's 312-vote margin.

Ginsberg said that the court spent "so much time patting themselves on the back" about Minnesota's election system that they failed to tackle the system's problems.

He said he's confident that the state Supreme Court will take seriously their case that the election wrongly denied thousands of Minnesotans their votes.

"You cannot know who won this election without coming to grips with the equal protection issue," Ginsberg said.

Kevin Duchschere • 651-292-0164

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