Hubbard County begins Senate race recount

The magic number stands at 215.

That's the difference, out of 2.9 million ballots cast Nov. 4, in the vote totals for Sen. Norm Coleman and challenger Al Franken.

This morning, the arduous task of counting those critical ballots will begin. The Hubbard County recount begins at 8:30 a.m. with three teams counting the 11,000+ ballots. Representatives of both the Coleman and Franken campaigns are expected to observe the count.

Recount personnel hope to finish tonight, said Hubbard County auditor Pam Heeren. Seven recount judges have been hired to assist her office hand count the ballots.

"We'll have three teams and each team will have a sorter and two counters," Heeren said. "Each team will take a precinct. The sorter will sort the ballots into three piles: those for Coleman, those for Franken and those for all others. Then they go through and count the piles. Any objections or challenges hopefully can be solved right then and there.

"They have to be based on voter intent issues and we just keep doing that over and over until we're done," she said.

"I'm hoping we can be done on Wednesday and a lot of that will depend on the number of challenges and I'm hoping that the candidates' reps have been schooled in voter intent because that's what they're looking for," she said.

Disputed ballots go to the State Canvassing Board to determine the voter's intent.

"I haven't really heard from the campaigns," Heeren added. "They've called to see how many teams we'll have, meaning they're sending the same number of reps but I haven't heard who that will be."

Much media coverage has been centered around the challenges and rejected ballots throughout Minnesota, particularly the tale of an elderly woman in Beltrami County whose vote was allegedly rejected because her post-stroke signature didn't match her pre-stroke one.

It turned out to be just that - a tale.

Hubbard County did have a small amount of rejected ballots, mostly because voters didn't take the time to read or follow the directions.

"Most of them were because the voter and/or the witness had not signed the back of the envelope," Heeren said. "Big as life - it says 'to be completed by the voter' and the bottom is to be completed by the witness and they either didn't have one or the other of those filled out.

It appears the Beltrami voter's ballot was rejected because of similar reasons.

"Of the 1,470 (absentee ballots) that we sent out, we had 23 rejected," Heeren said of the Hubbard County ballots.

Heeren said she didn't hear of any problems at the polls with voters being rejected, but that it has occurred in the past and may have this election. Sometimes voters cannot present the requisite proof of residency or don't have a witness that can vouch for their residency.

In the precincts observed on Election Day by Enterprise staff, election judges did everything they could to help voters' ballots count. And in a small county where everyone knows everyone else, it wasn't hard to find a registered voter to vouch for the residency of someone trying to vote, but without the necessary documentation.

"I'm sure every election we probably have some (rejected at the polls), but I'm not aware of it," Heeren said.

Sec. of State Mark Ritchie hopes the recount will be completed by mid-December, because it's highly likely litigation will follow regardless of who is declared the winner.

Franken has already sued to get the names and addresses of Ramsey County voters, hoping to query those who submitted ballots that were ultimately rejected. Coleman's campaign is reportedly poised to sift through those ballots, too, if a Ramsey County judge grants the request.

Both candidates want to interview voters to determine their intent, and probably to form the basis of a court case if those voters feel their ballots were unfairly rejected.

All 86 other counties may have to surrender their absentee ballots to the campaigns if the candidates prevail in Ramsey County.

Ironically, the lawsuit hearing is set for today, a few hours after the county-by-county recount starts.

Whether the information will benefit or hurt either candidate, including counting any rejected votes, remains to be seen.

What is certain is that the Minnesota Senate election of 2008 will surely not be concluded until 2009 - at the earliest.