Judges give Coleman partial vote-count win

ST. PAUL, Minn., Feb. 4 (UPI) -- The three-judge panel hearing Norm Coleman's challenge to the U.S. Senate race in Minnesota ruled that nearly 4,800 absentee ballots may be counted.

The decision Tuesday expanded the evidence that can be considered in Coleman's court challenge to overturn results in the U.S. Senate race in which Democrat Al Franken was declared the winner in a recount, the Star Tribune in Minneapolis reported Wednesday. Coleman had wanted up to 11,000 rejected absentee ballots reconsidered.

Coleman, then the incumbent, had a small enough lead after the Nov. 4 election to trigger an automatic recount. When that process was completed, Franken held a 225-vote lead.

In the ruling, the judges sitting in St. Paul said they would look at rejected absentee ballots cast by voters who complied with Minnesota election law requirements or didn't comply because of local election officials' errors.

"We're very, very pleased with the ruling," said the Republican's legal spokesman Ben Ginsberg, predicting "the vast majority" of the 4,797 ballots would be accepted and counted.

Franken lead recount lawyer Marc Elias said the ruling was "neither a loss nor a win." His team also raised the possibility of asking the court to consider absentee ballots that they believe were wrongly rejected, perhaps as many as 771.

In a separate ruling, judges rejected Coleman's motion to automatically count thousands of rejected absentee ballots without his having to go to trial. Coleman argued for automatically counting rejected absentee ballots that were cast by someone who was living on Election Day and weren't fraudulent.