Coleman may seek to halt ballot recount

ST. PAUL, Minn., Dec. 12 (UPI) -- Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., said Friday he'll ask the state high court to halt the counting of rejected votes in his re-election bid until standards are set.

Earlier Friday, the Minnesota state Board of Canvassers decided to ask county election boards to count improperly rejected absentee ballots in the battle between Coleman and challenger Democrat Al Franken, the St. Paul Pioneer Press reported.

In raising the possibility of an appeal to the state Supreme Court, Coleman's campaign said counties need a consistent statewide set of rules on how to define and count rejected absentee ballots after the canvassing board's decision.

At issue is how county-level canvassing boards sort rejected absentee ballots, the Star Tribune in Minneapolis reported. The Coleman campaign has contended there has been an inconsistent application.

"We want to make very sure that what happens in Thief River is the same thing that happens in Eagan and everywhere else," Coleman attorney Fritz Knaak said during a news conference.

The announcement from Coleman's camp came just hours after the canvassing board, which is overseeing the recount in the contest between Coleman and Franken, voted unanimously to ask election officials in all 87 counties to identify and count improperly rejected ballots.

The Secretary of State's office told the canvassing board that 49 counties examined 4,823 rejected absentee ballots and 638 of those were determined by local officials to have been wrongfully rejected.

Deputy Secretary of State Jim Gelbmann said if that trend holds, more than 13 percent of the rejected absentee ballots being tossed improperly -- nearly 1,600 ballots -- would have been wrongfully set aside.