2:53The tedious-but-critical process of reviewing unopened ballots that could decide Minnesota's U.S. Senate race resumed today, with Hennepin and Ramsey counties among those undertaking the task.
In Ramsey County, election officials and representatives of the Norm Coleman and Al Franken campaigns were reviewing 133 unopened absentee ballots that the county believes were wrongly rejected. As of mid-day, the reviewers had gone over 108 and agreed to send 67 to the Secretary of State's office to be opened, counted and added to the results.
In Hennepin County, Democrat Al Franken's campaign quickly blocked an attempt by Sen. Norm Coleman to add ballots to the 329 rejected absentee ballots county officials were ready to consider.
"We object to each of those," David Lillehaug, a Franken recount attorney, said to the 170 ballots Coleman wanted to add to the total.
Bill McGinley, a Coleman attorney, offered to include 30 ballots Franken wanted to add to the total if Franken's lawyers agreed to add the 170 ballots Coleman wanted -- but Lillehaug nixed that offer too.
"We ask that you reach agreement," said Jill Alverson, the county auditor, who said the county would not consider any extra ballots unless the two campaigns agreed to add them.
So with no agreement, the two campaigns watched as county officials slowly went through each of the 329 ballots, starting with 38 ballots in Bloomington, the county's second largest city. After nearly an hour, the campaigns accepted 26 ballots from Bloomington and rejected 12 others. Of the 12 rejections, the Coleman campaign accounted for eight, and Franken blocked the other four.
DFLer Franken currently holds an unofficial 49-vote lead over Republican incumbent Coleman, pending the counting of whatever absentee ballots are added to the mix.
Under a court ruling, the counties and campaigns must agree on which ballots were wrongly rejected, and those will be sent to the Secretary of State's office, which will count them and give the results to the state Canvassing Board to review Monday. Before this week's review, local election officials had identified 1,346 ballots statewide that may have been wrongly rejected.
In Ramsey County, 26 of the 41 ballots that were held back because of objections from the two campaigns came from New Brighton. In those instances, absentee voters were not registered or not registered at their current addresses but given materials that assumed that they were.
The atmosphere in St. Paul was civil and cooperative this morning, just a day after the recount battle had raged from Hastings to Washington, with Democrats edging closer to declaring victory for Franken and campaign lawyers sparred over counting hundreds of rejected absentee ballots at meetings across the state.
"At this stage, it appears that Franken will be certified the winner by the state Canvassing Board," Jim Manley, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said Tuesday afternoon. "We're keeping abreast of the situation and will make a decision with regard to Senate action at the appropriate point in the process."
