Sen. Coleman Conference Call
This morning, I participated in a blogger conference call with Sen. Norm Coleman and attorney Ben Ginsburg. Sen. Coleman opened with a statement that yesterday’s ruling to allow 4,800 absentee ballots to be counted “was a great day for Minnesotans.”
The first question was asked by Janet Beihoffer of SCSUScholars. Janet asked if the absentee ballots that were ruled on yesterday were from Republican-leaning parts of the state.
Sen. Coleman’s initial response was that he didn’t know how the people voted. His next response was that the fifth pile absentee ballots that have already been counted were from precincts that leaned heavily Democratic. Mr. Ginsburg put the total of fifth pile ballots at 950+.
Both gentlemen stressed the fact that Franken’s lead was artificial. By that they meant that the lead Franken currently has will likely shrink when ballots from more Republican-friendly parts of the state are counted.
Ed Morrissey of HotAir directed the next question towards Mr. Ginsburg. Ed asked if yesterday’s ruling brought any Equal Protection issues into play. This was a clear reference to Bush v. Gore. Mr. Ginsburg said that the ruling followed Minnesota law. Mr. Ginsburg then said that, in Bush v. Gore, the Florida Supreme Court ignored relevant Florida law and essentially wrote their own new law.
Ginsburg also said that mistakenly rejecting absentee ballots or mistakenly accepting absentee ballots isn’t grounds for an Equal Protection argument.
The next question came from Amanda Carpenter of Townhall.com. She asked whether Franken’s tax problems had been resolved. Sen. Coleman said that some of Mr. Franken’s tax problems were resolved but they weren’t certain that all of his issues had gotten resolved. (Personally, if Franken loses the recount, he’d fit perfectly into President Obama’s cabinet.)
Next up was Philip Klein of the American Spectator, who asked whether this election contest was the end of the line. Mr. Klein also asked for an explanation of the duplicate ballots issue. Sen. Coleman said that this isn’t about exhausting all of his legal options in the hopes of winning. He said that it’s about making certain that every legally cast ballot is counted. Sen. Coleman expressed confidence that he’ll win if every legally cast ballot is counted, then added that if Mr. Franken winds up with more votes after the ballots are counted, then Mr. Franken will have won.
The final questioner was Soren Dayton of The Next Right and Redstate. Soren asked if the Senate would be forced to seat Sen. Coleman if he was certified the winner or if Harry Reid might try playing some shennanigans to prevent Sen. Coleman from serving in the Senate. Sen. Coleman asked how Sen. Reid’s comments about not seating Roland Burris worked out.
Asked if a re-vote was possible, Sen. Coleman said that they wouldn’t get into hypothetical questions but did say that certified election winners traditionally get seated.
They ended the call before I got to ask my question. I’d planned on asking whether the election contest would’ve been able to proceed if Sen. Cornyn hadn’t threatened to filibuster Sen. Reid’s attempt to ‘temporarily’ seat Mr. Franken.
UPDATE: Ed’s got a good post up about the call here.
Technorati Tags: Recount, Norm Coleman, Absentee Ballots, Al Franken, Harry Reid, Bush v. Gore, Equal Protection Clause
Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog