Category: Al Franken
Posted: 07/14/10 15:49
by Dave Mindeman
Republicans continue several galling narratives that distort any semblance of truth. One of these in Minnesota involves the Senate election of 2008. You remember, the seemingly endless election that Al Franken won. And he did win. It wasn't stolen. It wasn't rigged. It wasn't fabricated. The election happened. It went through an orderly and lawful recount. It went through a court determination of validity. All of it said Al Franken won.
Yet, Republicans continue to challenge every aspect of this election. The latest version involves convicted felons voting... and Governor
Pawlenty is the latest to promote this ridiculous assertion. And of course, it is on Fox News (especially Fox and Friends - the mouthpiece of GOP fluff) which accepts any assertion that favors the GOP regardless of factual content.
This all started when Minnesota Majority, a GOP front group and think tank, began a sloppy investigation of potential abuse by felons of the voting process. I say sloppy because there is very little fact in this process and a lot of innuendo.
Nevertheless,
Twin Cities prosecutors followed up on the report. And although the investigation is ongoing, some of the reports are already coming out:
The Ramsey County Attorney's Office said Monday it is investigating about 180 cases out of 500 that were brought forward by Minnesota Majority, which recently completed an 18-month study of state voter and criminal conviction lists. Charges were brought against 28 felons for allegedly voting or registering illegally in 2008. But another 267 reports were found to be "inaccurate" after an initial review, according to Ramsey County Prosecution Division Director Phil Carruthers.That was Ramsey County. A similar situation in Hennepin:
Deputy Hennepin County Attorney Pat Diamond said his office is still looking at 216 allegations flagged by Minnesota Majority, out of 451 that were brought forward by the group. No charges have been brought as a result of the report, though a handful of other individuals have been charged with fraudulent voting.Some problems with the MN Majority report are obvious:
But local and state officials say the group's reports are likely inflated and hard to verify because of difficulties determining whether the suspected felon voters had their voting rights restored, if they knew they were ineligible to vote, or if they were actually the people whose names appear on voter rolls.Phil Carruthers is a prosecutor on these cases. It just happens that he was once a DFL House Leader. He is dutifully looking at these cases as a prosecutor should....but the end results are dubious:
"Overwhelmingly, their statistics were not accurate," Carruthers said. "But I would say they did the best they could, given their access to the databases."What Minnesota Majority doesn't talk about is that because of voter privacy, the data they used is sparse and very incomplete. For instance, they could only get the year of birth for voters -- not the exact date. Thus similar names could cover a number of voters and yet MN Majority would extrapolate names to meet their idea of fraudulence.
MN Majority justifies their questioning of Franken's legitimacy in this manner:
But Minnesota Majority Executive Director Dan McGrath said that while there's a "possibility" that illegal voting by felons could have made the difference, there's no way to know, since ballots are secret. "That's not the point we're trying to make," McGrath said. "The point is there's a problem and we want to prevent its recurrence."Just looking out for the best interest of Minnesota elections?
Well, the only reason this is being brought up is because of how close this election was. We have certainly had felons voting in past elections....there is little doubt of that. So this problem is not new. The only reason McGrath and his group are concerned now is that the election outcome was not what they wanted.
They will continue to rehash these assertions for the entire length of Franken's term. They wish to cast doubt on the Minnesota process... and claim that somehow, the system was going to elect Al Franken regardless of voter intent.
Yet, all the real evidence begs to differ.
Norm Coleman contested the election in court. You may be surprised to hear me say this, but I am glad he did. Without that court trial and without the intense examination of the process that it provided, these bogus claims that continue to service would get more credence than they deserve.
During the recount, they did find a felon who voted. Obviously, he committed an additional felony. Oddly enough though, he stated that he voted for Coleman. Yet, despite that, during the trial phase Coleman's lawyers never brought forth any evidence that would cast any widespread claim of similar illegal voting by felons.
That was the purpose of the trial phase. To bring in the evidence. Yet the Coleman lawyers followed a different path. One that points to a methodology that was less concerned with getting the process right and more concerned with getting the right outcome.
As in Florida, the Republican strategy was to stop the counting. No more votes. Coleman had a lead on election night and that was where he wished it to end. But the law required a recount. It was automatic and no statement from Coleman or Franken could have changed that.
During the recount phase, Coleman's strategy was to continue supressing any additional ballots. To question the corrections that favored Franken. Again, to stop the counting.
As things changed, and Franken moved into a lead, the Coleman strategy changed as well. Now behind, the Coleman lawyers wanted more inclusion. Get all the absentee ballots included. Some ballots were counted without meeting legal requirements, so let's bring them all in.
It was a legal strategy without substance, because they ignored the rules of evidence. They had no evidence. They only wanted a method to change the outcome.
Republicans will continue to delegitimize Franken's Senate win. But when pressed, we need to remember the basics of it all:
1) Coleman exhausted all of his legal methods to challenge the election. They only increased the Franken lead.
2) Not one of the judges involved with the canvass board or the trial phase was appointed by a Democrat.
3) One of the key decisions that favored Franken in the canvass was promoted by Justice Magnuson - Pawlenty's former law partner and Pawlenty's appointed Chief Justice.
4) All of the questions brought forward by Coleman's lawyers in the trial phase got favorable Franken rulings by a unanimous court.
5) Despite the rhetoric, Secretary of State Mark Ritchie followed the recount regulations to the letter, and despite receiving criticism from Republicans and Democrats alike.
Again, if you want the complete details of each phase of the 2008 Senate race, read Jay Weiner's book: "
This Is Not Florida" -- which will be out in September.
