# How's Al Franken's Senate bid going? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 12, 2008, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239 "2008-02-12T01:57:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Sinaijon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@Sinaijon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sinaijon)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/181 "2008-11-11T16:13:37Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Why would a candidate even need to request that ballots be counted? Shouldn’t they have been counted in the first place? That’s the problem, I think. If they were recieved on time, they should have been counted already. The race is close, and all of a sudden, all these extra ballots start showing up after the fact. There was a similar problem with a bunch of ballots that were left in somebody’s car. Not exactly the most secure storage. It opens the door for complaints when recount numbers start not matching up with the original counts. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/182 "2008-11-11T16:36:22Z")
[Looks like things could get ugly.](http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,449334,00.html) ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/183 "2008-11-11T16:37:45Z")
I’m hearing a lot of boo hooing from Republicans that Coleman’s lead keeps shrinking, but I have yet to see any actual evidence of fraud or tampering. The Fox News piece is a joke. All insinuation, no evidence. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/184 "2008-11-11T16:40:11Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > I’m hearing a lot of boo hooing from Republicans that Coleman’s lead keeps shrinking, but I have yet to see any actual evidence of fraud or tampering. > > The Fox News piece is a joke. All insinuation, no evidence. Who needs evidence? See post #181. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/185 "2008-11-11T16:44:02Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > I’m hearing a lot of boo hooing from Republicans that Coleman’s lead keeps shrinking, but I have yet to see any actual evidence of fraud or tampering. > > The Fox News piece is a joke. All insinuation, no evidence. I like the way they slipped a mention of Acorn in even though it really does not apply to Minnesota. Fox probably already knows the recount will go to Franken and they are trying to play the hurt party first. But like them I have no evidence either. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/186 "2008-11-11T17:20:22Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Why would a candidate even need to request that ballots be counted? Shouldn’t they have been counted in the first place? I believe these may be ones that were run through the optical scanner, but did not register a vote. (This happens more often with absentee ballots, because they don’t get the explanation from a poll worker on how to fill out the ballot correctly.) The Franken campaign was asking that these be looked at by humans, to determine if they could see a clear vote on them. That is what will be done with ALL the ballots during the recount. Of course, Franken wanted that done now because Hennepin County went strongly for Franken; if these absentee ballots went the same way he would then be in the lead by a couple hundred ballots. That would give a psychological advantage going into the recount. ---
**Author:** ![Camus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ba8739/32.png) [@Camus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Camus)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/187 "2008-11-11T18:02:31Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > I like the way they slipped a mention of Acorn in even though it really does not apply to Minnesota. Fox probably already knows the recount will go to Franken and they are trying to play the hurt party first. But like them I have no evidence either. 😃 And the author of that piece’s blog is full of anti-Obama crap and has a few articles praising Palin. He’s no journalist. ---
**Author:** ![Snickers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@Snickers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snickers)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/188 "2008-11-11T18:09:17Z")
The Fox article also seems to have misleading information in it - for example, it says that if a voter doesn’t vote in a contested matchup, then the machine rejects it in order for the voter to mark the ballot for that competition. That’s not how it worked in Robbinsdale (a north MPLS suburb), at least for me. I didn’t vote in any of the judge elections - I didn’t follow these, had no information on which to base a decision, and thus left those contest to those who did - and my ballot went into the box just fine. No beeps, no returns, nothing. When I voted, there were a couple of people in front of me for whom the machine _did_ beep (the beep indicating an error) - when the voter acted surprised as to the beep, the election official indicated that he or she should feed it in again. Sometimes it beeped again, sometimes it didn’t. I remember the official saying something about how “it’s been beeping a lot like that,” but there wasn’t really any investigation about why (which probably couldn’t be done anyway, either to the machine or to ask the voter any questions about his or her ballot). I did find that rather strange, but as long as I didn’t get any beeps, I left it alone. ---
**Author:** ![Tastes\_of\_Chocolate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tastes_of_chocolate/32/3232_2.png) [@Tastes\_of\_Chocolate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tastes_of_Chocolate)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/189 "2008-11-11T18:16:57Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Why would a candidate even need to request that ballots be counted? Shouldn’t they have been counted in the first place? In Minnesota, most (I don’t know if it’s all) ballots are of the fill-in-the-bubble type, which are then read by an optical scanner. There are a percentage that register either as a multiple vote (more then one candidate chosen) or no vote. In elections that aren’t even close, no one takes the time to hand examine those ballots. In a close election, those are all looked at individually, to see if it is possible to tell what the voter was trying to do. In no vote situations, maybe the voter circled the name or put a check mark after it, rather then filling in the circle. In multiple votes, maybe the filled in circle got sloppy and over ran into anothe circle, or maybe one circle was filled in by mistake, crossed off, and another circle filled in. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2008, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/190 "2008-11-11T18:20:15Z")
> [@Snickers](#): > > The Fox article also seems to have misleading information in it - for example, it says that if a voter doesn’t vote in a contested matchup, then the machine rejects it in order for the voter to mark the ballot for that competition. That’s not how it worked in Robbinsdale (a north MPLS suburb), at least for me. I didn’t vote in any of the judge elections The machines (ES&S Model 100’s, modified with remote reporters) can be set to beep & reject for both undervotes (leaving a race blank) and overvotes (voting for 2 candidates for the same office). In Hennepin County, most were set to reject overvotes, but allow undervotes. Mainly because of those Judge elections you mentioned. So many of them are unopposed, and voters just skip them. My ballot had 54 races, and at least half of them (Judges, Soil & Water Conservation Commissioners, etc.) had only a single candidate. I voted in every one, but many, many voter do not. Beeping at those would really slow down the voting process. ---
**Author:** ![NurseCarmen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5daacb/32.png) [@NurseCarmen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NurseCarmen)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2008, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/191 "2008-11-12T01:07:29Z")
Another problem with the Fox News report regarding the sudden jump in votes in two harbors. Before the canvas, Franken’s vote count was zero. As was Coleman’s. As was Barkley’s. The old farts hadn’t sent in there vote totals, and that was caught in the canvas. Pretty straight forward. And the kind of thing a canvas is set up to catch. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2008, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/192 "2008-11-19T18:52:40Z")
[Recount begins today!](http://www.startribune.com/politics/national/senate/34736454.html?elr=KArksc8P:Pc:UthPacyPE7iUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU) ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/47e85d/32.png) [@Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Lance_Murdoch)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2008, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/193 "2008-11-19T19:31:09Z")
> [@Sinaijon](#): > > That’s the problem, I think. If they were recieved on time, they should have been counted already. The race is close, and all of a sudden, all these extra ballots start showing up after the fact. > > There was a similar problem with a bunch of ballots that were left in somebody’s car. Not exactly the most secure storage. It opens the door for complaints when recount numbers start not matching up with the original counts. You’ve mischaracterized the issue. It’s not a matter of them not being received on time. There were rejected for a variety of reasons including the judgement call of the signatures not matching and the lack of election official’s signatures which is out of the hands of the voters. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/47e85d/32.png) [@Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Lance_Murdoch)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2008, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/194 "2008-11-19T20:05:46Z")
And now this in… Franken won his challenge in Ramsey Co. to get the names of voters whose absentee ballots were rejected. This was considered key in Franken’s quest to get improperly rejected ballots to counted. The coleman campaign will have access to the same information, of course, but they argued that it shouldn’t be released so it remains to be seen if they will stick to their guns on that principle or start going after the data themselves (especially in Republican-leaning areas). The county has until the end of today to turn the information over. ---
**Author:** ![ShibbOleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@ShibbOleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShibbOleth)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2008, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/195 "2008-11-19T20:20:14Z")
> [@Sinaijon](#): > > That’s the problem, I think. If they were recieved on time, they should have been counted already. The race is close, and all of a sudden, all these extra ballots start showing up after the fact. > > There was a similar problem with a bunch of ballots that were left in somebody’s car. Not exactly the most secure storage. It opens the door for complaints when recount numbers start not matching up with the original counts. Really? > [@](#): > > Reichert is all too happy to provide an explanation. She says the “car ballot” story is “just not true,” painting a picture of normal balloting procedures twisted into something grotesquely misleading. > > The “car ballot” story emerged Saturday **from the mouth of Coleman lawyer Fritz Knaak** , who, according to AP, told reporters, “We were actually told ballots had been riding around in her car for several days, which raised all kinds of integrity questions.” > > Knaak never provided a source and did not return two MinnPost calls for comment. However, he was already backing off his story at the same press event. As that day’s Pioneer Press noted, “Knaak said he feels assured that what was going on with the 32 ballots was neither wrong nor unfair.” > > Still, the lie that won’t die is that Reichert toted around ballots like an empty McDonald’s bag thrown into the back seat. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2008, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/196 "2008-11-19T21:42:37Z")
> [@](#): > > The “car ballot” story emerged Saturday from the mouth of Coleman lawyer Fritz Knaak, who, according to AP, told reporters, “We were actually told ballots had been riding around in her car for several days, which raised all kinds of integrity questions.” > > Knaak never provided a source and did not return two MinnPost calls for comment. However, he was already backing off his story at the same press event. As that day’s Pioneer Press noted, “Knaak said he feels assured that what was going on with the 32 ballots was neither wrong nor unfair.” > > Still, the lie that won’t die is that Reichert toted around ballots like an empty McDonald’s bag thrown into the back seat. This really is an absolute lie, kept alive by people who hope to benefit by casting doubt on the ballot counting. I know Cindy Reichert, and she is as honest and obsessive about ballot integrity as anyone I have ever seen. And there is obvious evidence of her impartiality – she is attacked by everybody, from the far left Green Party/IRV supporters to this libelous attack by the far right ex-Legislator Knaak for the Coleman campaign. That people from all parts of the political spectrum are mad at her testifies to her strictly equal enforcement of the voting laws. ---
**Author:** ![Cliffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/59ef9b/32.png) [@Cliffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cliffy)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2008, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/197 "2008-11-19T21:58:08Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#): > > I don’t know of any statewide Minnesota election that has been tied. Closest was in 1962, when it took until March, 1963 to decide the winner by 91 votes. > > It’s happened occasionally in local elections, though, both in Minnesota and other states. I heard a story on NPR this week about a local race somewhere (don’t know where) this cycle that was decided by a coin flip. –Cliffy ---
**Author:** ![Lochdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/edb3f5/32.png) [@Lochdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lochdale)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2008, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/198 "2008-11-19T22:03:07Z")
> [@NurseCarmen](#): > > I find immigration in Minnesota to be an interesting thing. Just the curly cue letters in the Hmong translations make it worth the price of admission. Interesting is one way of putting it. Apparently there have been numerous problems with integration there. [http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/200202/04\_williamsb\_africans/somalis](http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/200202/04_williamsb_africans/somalis) ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/47e85d/32.png) [@Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Lance_Murdoch)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2008, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/199 "2008-11-20T02:30:57Z")
Coleman’s margin has shrunk to 181 thanks largely to a bunch of old machines in St. Louis county (Duluth) that failed to read lightly marked ballots. Coleman lost 34 votes off his lead on the first day of the recount. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2008, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239/200 "2008-11-24T19:54:16Z")
[Coleman’s lead down to 187 votes.](http://www.startribune.com/politics/national/senate/) In this kind of situation, there really should be some provision for a runoff between the top two finishers. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hows-al-frankens-senate-bid-going/437239.md?page=11)