| First and foremost, this order is not the three-judge panel's final ruling on the case, but rather an intermediate step.
The Star Tribune:
In a potentially decisive ruling, a panel of three judges today ordered up to 400 new absentee ballots opened and counted, far fewer than Republican Norm Coleman had sought in his effort to overcome a lead held by DFLer Al Franken.
The ballots appear to include many that Franken had identified as wrongly rejected as well as ballots that Coleman wanted opened. About half come from Hennepin, Ramsey and St. Louis counties, places Franken won by significant margins. ...
The panel emphasized that some of the nearly 400 ballots might not be counted, but were included in the order because their eligibilty was unclear. ...
The three-judge panel ordered the ballots delivered to the Secretary of State's Office by April 6 and those deemed legal to be opened and counted April 7 in the Supreme Court room at the Minnesota Judicial Center.
In rejecting most of the ballots Coleman had sought to open, the panel dismissed his lawyers' arguments that it apply a more lenient standard in deciding which ballots should be counted.
Once again, this order (which you can read in its entirety in PDF by clicking on this link) does not rule on the entirety of the election contest or on specific aspects of the contest like Republican Norm Coleman's purely theoretical "double-counting" myth. Rather, this order calls for the opening of nearly 400 ballots - that's it.
However, there is a lot that can be inferred from this order. For one, these nearly 400 ballots may be the last ones entered into the mix. Coleman obviously wanted a much higher number ballots counted. The relatively small number both limits the universe of ballots that might impact the numerical result and also indicates that the three-judge panel are not taking a lenient standard in ballot-counting, as the Star Tribune points out. Further, that the ballots to be counted include such a relatively large percentage of ballots that the Franken camp wanted counted indicates that the three-judge panel has determined that the Franken legal team has made the stronger case in court. In short, this is very good news for Senator-elect Al Franken and very bad news for Republican Norm Coleman.
It is unclear when the three-judge panel will make a final ruling, but I'd suppose that it would not come until after these nearly 400 ballots are opened, reviewed and possibly counted, which will take place a week from today. More as it develops. |
