Campaign Diaries

Coleman’s lead is melting away - but perhaps not fast enough for Franken to overtake him before the canvassing board convenes on December 16th. At the end of two full days of recounting, 44% of ballots have been recounting and Coleman’s lead has fallen from 215 to 136 votes.

St. Louis County was particularly kind to Franken for the second day in a row. 18 of the county’s precincts use scanning machines (called Eagles) that require a voter draw an arrow. The machines are outdated, so they have trouble sensing the arrow when it is faintly drawn. Because the voter’s intent is clear, these ballot get tallied during the manual recount. Both candidates have added voters in this manner - but St. Louis County is a Democratic stronghold, which explains why Franken gained more.

The good news for Coleman is that Franken needs to pick up votes at a higher pace to close the gap. The good news for Franken is that the precincts that have been recounted have been more Republican than the state at-large, meaning that areas more favorable to Franken still remain to be recounted.

Furthermore, 823 ballots have been challenged (414 by Franken staffers and 409 by Coleman staffers). Needless to say, the number of challenged ballots is far superior to the margin between the candidates (and it will still grow further) making it impossible to call a winner until the canvassing board rules on these challenges.

Minnesota Public Radio’s must-see collection of challenged ballots suggests that most of them are not that controversial and will easily be processed in the canvassing board. The ballot below, for instance, has been challenged by the Coleman campaign which argues that the voter intended to cast a ballot for Coleman because there is a dot next to his name. There appears to be little doubt that the vote will end up in the Barkley column when the canvassing board meet:

On the other hand, the following ballot might be more controversial, as it demands a more careful deliberation - though Minnesota’s liberal definition of voter intent probably ensures that the vote will count for Franken:

Meanwhile, in OH-15, 27,306 absentee and provisional ballots in Democratic Franklin County remain to be counted in the race between Mary Jo Kilroy and Steve Stivers. The latter currently leads by more 149 479 votes with both of the red counties entirely counted - so needless to say, those Franklin County votes are hugely important. These ballots have been on hold for more than two weeks because of a dispute over 1,000 of them (Ohio law demands that no provisional ballot be counted if there is a dispute over any of them).

These ballots had been challenged because there was no signature on the external envelope (seemingly against state rules), but Secretary of State Jennifer Burner instructed that they be counted. The dispute was dragged to court - and a federal judge ruled today that these ballots should be counted because the burden was on poll workers to remind voters to sign the envelope.

This is a clear victory for Democratic nominee Kilroy, who stands to gain as provisional ballots get counted. (Provisionals typically favor Democrats.) It also means that the rest of the ballots will finally get counted - and we can hope to have updated results in the days ahead!