We've all been celebrating the wonderful progressive wave that happened on Tuesday. But of course, there are still some very important races remaining undecided. One of the most important is the Minnesota Senatorial contest and the attempt to take back Paul Wellstone's seat. Tuesday night Franken was roughly 700 behind.
Minnesota law mandates a recount when the result is this close, and there is considerable optimism because there's roughly a 25,000 undervote -- where voters who had chosen a Presidential candidate either chose not to vote for a Senatorial candidate...or a vote was not recorded. By Friday evening, the numbers had been revised until Franken stands only 221 behind.
More after the jump...
Minnesota law mandates a recount when the result is this close, and there is considerable optimism because there's roughly a 25,000 undervote -- where voters who had chosen a Presidential candidate either chose not to vote for a Senatorial candidate...or a vote was not recorded. By Friday evening, the numbers had been revised until Franken stands only 221 behind.
The AP reports that most of the undervotes are in Obama territory. The recount will begin on November 19th with manual inspection. Voter intent will be established according to the RECOUNT GUIDE. In many cases voter intent cannot be discerned. There may be ACTUAL undervotes, where the voter might have recorded a Presidential vote and walked away without recording a Senate choice at all.
After working with the county level data, I've determined Franken stands a very good chance in the recount, but it will still be razor thin.
Taking the county level results, I tabulated the undervotes and looked at the party percentages on the Presidential and Senatorial races.
The results currently online at the MN Secretary of State's website are not recounted votes, but there are still a few places where votes can be revised. And I've heard indications that there were some absentee ballots that still remain uncounted, but that is hard to verify.
The problem with counties where Obama won is that the 3rd party vote in Minnesota is very different for the Senate race. In the presidential race, there were 61,593 3rd party votes recorded. However, in the Senatorial race, there were 462,560 3rd party votes.
If we assume the undervotes break in the same party proportions for that county's DEM/REP Senate vote, then Franken is likely to pick up a net +527 votes in the recount.
The implication is that Franken may win by roughly 200-300 votes. That margin is about 8/1000% of the total votes cast, or 3 votes per COUNTY.
What a case study for the importance of every single vote!!! In this case, the 3rd party Senatorial vote is roughly 2000 times the eventual margin of victory!
In addition Coleman has his lawyers lined up to sue over any irregularities and is challenging the shifts that have already occurred.
There's plenty of room for drama remaining...but the fact that the undervotes are in Obama-friendly counties may not matter at all. The third-party vote in the Minnesota Senatorial race makes that the wrong indicator to be watching.
Still...partly because of hope, and partly because of my analysis of the county results, I believe Franken will win but by fewer than 500 votes.