Coleman suffers additional defeat; 1400 ballots without registration will not be considered [View All]

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Increasingly desperate to find any votes that could keep him in office the Coleman campaign had high hopes that 1500 rejected absentee ballots would provide the magic numbers he needs.

County clerks, however, found that of this number only 89 had valid registrations and the other 1400 will not be considered. The 89 with valid registrations may face other problems. In any case the shrinking pool of questionable ballots that can even be argued about has made a change in the recount even more impossible.

Smaller vote pool may hurt Coleman

http://www.startribune.com/politics/national/senate/40965532.html?elr=KArks8c7PaP3E77K_3c::D3aDhUxWoW_oD:EaDUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aULPQL7PQLanchO7DiUr

A review of 1,500 secrecy envelopes turned up registration cards that may now turn 89 rejected ballots into accepted ones. Norm Coleman hoped for a higher yield.

By PAT DOYLE and KEVIN DUCHSCHERE, Star Tribune staff writers

Last update: March 10, 2009 - 2:52 PM

Republican Norm Coleman had hoped an inspection of hundreds of secrecy envelopes holding rejected absentee ballots would yield enough additional votes to help him cut into DFLer Al Franken's 225-vote lead. But it turned out that only 89 of them had valid registrations.

. . .

The three-judge panel hearing the U.S. Senate trial ordered county officials to inspect about 1,500 secrecy envelopes, which the two campaigns identified as possibly containing the completed voter registration forms needed for them to be counted. Each campaign had identified roughly the same number of envelopes for inspection.

It was not known for whom the ballots were cast, but two-thirds of those containing valid registrations are from counties that Coleman carried on Nov. 4.

Because of the size of his deficit, Coleman needs to put a substantial number of new ballots in play. The 700 secrecy envelopes that he identified for inspection were among thousands of ballots that he has claimed may have been improperly rejected.

After the secretary of state's office identified the 89 as having valid registration forms, Franken lawyer Marc Elias said the number was well below the threshold that "might have opened up" the contest. Elias also said the 89 ballots could be challenged on other grounds.