Minnesota's Pile of Unopened Absentee Ballots Down to 387 in U.S. Senate Race
Democrat Al Franken, above, now leads Republican Norm Coleman by 312 votes in Minnesota's long-running U.S. Senate race.
(Kevin Wolf - AP)
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Tuesday, April 7, 2009
ST. PAUL, Minn., April 6 -- The pile of unopened absentee ballots that could be counted for Minnesota's delayed Senate contest between Al Franken and Norm Coleman has fallen to 387.
Deputy Secretary of State Jim Gelbmann said Monday that all cities and counties had complied with a special court's order to submit ballot envelopes and supporting materials for the ballots, which had previously been rejected. The court plans to open eligible ballots Tuesday.
Democrat Franken leads Republican Coleman by 225 votes.
Minnesota saw a surge in absentee voting last fall, but about 12,000 ballots were turned away for one reason or another.
To date, nearly 1,000 of those ballots have been deemed mistakenly rejected and have been added to the count.
