The Norm Coleman team just held a conference call in which the campaign’s lawyers, Fritz Knaak and Tony Trimble, discussed the latest developments in the ongoing recount debacle in Minnestota.
This morning, the Coleman and Franken campaigns had a testy meeting over the issue of counting rejected absentee ballots, with the Coleman campaign arguing that Franken is pushing for ballots in counties most favorable to its cause be counted.
“We are stunned by the Franken campaign’s hypocrisy about counting every vote,” Knaak said on the call. “They don’t want to count every vote. They want to count every Franken vote.”
Specifically, Knaak noted that several affidavits that Franken submitted in Dakota and Ramsey counties to make the case to count certain absentee ballots turned out to be fake.
The Star Tribune has estimated that Franken is now up by 46 votes, but the Coleman campaign said they believe they are ahead. Also, if their court challenge to eliminate double-counting of duplicate ballots succeeds, they said they expect a net gain of over 100 votes.
Either way, it’s increasingly looking like a race that won’t be resolved for weeks, at the earliest.
