Wolf poop? Meet spinning air distribution device.
Yikes! Team Coleman surprised (mostly by acting like lawyers rather than continue acting like lint-heads) and filed a motion for a restraining order to undo a stipulated agreement and so begin UNCOUNTING ballots. Team Franken was opposed (and HOW!).
Clashing paper, followed by lawyers arguing the motion in court.
Franken leads +249 (Coleman's motion IF GRANTED = -176 and leave Franken at +49; Pending.)
No MN Supreme Court Decision re: Franken motion to force a Certificate of Election. (Day 16 since hearing.)
No winner yet and no end date in sight. Thus endeth capsule for those just needing the skim version. Whipped cream is just past the Orange fold.......
Handy Link:
Front pager Brownsox was up with a late afternoon story on this here:http://www.dailykos.com/...
Kossack (and attorney) FischFry was up with a midnight diary on the legal ins and outs of Friday's action. In case of cnflict between his understanding and mine, PLEASE defer to his expertise (but I'm holding the line on wolf poop.)
http://www.dailykos.com/...
1) Election Contest Court (ECC)--Episode XXV: Drop the Gloves; Center Ice.
OK. Another ho-hum Friday in the offing, made even ho-er-hummier knowing Coleman's minions would be once again flogging a 4 million year old petrified, dead eohippus of a case again in court.
billw: Someone suggested the other night that court be held ON Lake Minnetonka. As the ice gets thinner, the participants will talk faster, guaranteeing completion by ice-out
As happens, there was a delay until nearly 10am as another "in chambers" head-to-head between lawyers and judges was thrashed through. But this time we got the thrashing and the fallout.
2) Back to "Pile 5"?!
To review: MN requires absentee ballots meet 4 tests in order to be considered valid. Twice during the Recount local officials were directed to sort rejected absentee ballots into piles, 1 for each of the 4 reasons a ballot failed. Well there was some slop in the system: statewide 1346 absentee ballots were rejected locally but NOT for a legal reason. Local officials wanted to correct their earlier mistakes and open and count these.
Franken agreed-- all of them. Coleman said, "Some of them, maybe." A legal wrangle ensued and when the snowballs finished flying in the courts both campaigns and the local officials agreed to open and count 933 of these ballots.
They were opened and counted on Jan. 3. It took a stinking 6 hours because the Sec. of State's office first took time to mark each ballot and the secrecy envelope it came "just in case" (some shorthand like: "Cottonwood Co, Jim Beam Precinct, ward 2" AND --important-- why (of 4 reasons) this ballot had initially been rejected.). Then we had that glorious 45 minute read-off of "Franken, Franken, Barkley, Coleman, Franken, Coleman, Franken, Franken, NIEMACKL!" and Al's lead went from +49 to +225.
With me so far?
Now everybody AGREED to all of the above, in writing, and even used lawyer talk:
Agree to = "stipulate".
NO crossed fingers, No take backs, NO do overs, which in lawyer talk comes out as "stipulate with prejudice."
Because its really strong you make REALLY sure of before you "stipulate with prejudice": "Yes this is a 1951 Evinrude outboard motor, serial #....... found in the victim's boathouse." If you are trying an inter-solar case you stipulate with prejudice "the sun rises in the east... ON EARTH" particularly when suing in a Uranian Court (since there it doesn't.)
Both sides agreed to stipulate with prejudice this count of 933. And on Feb. 3 both sides also agreed via Court Order the SoS's office could go ahead and redact (erase, cut out, black magic marker) those ballot shorthands (including reason for rejection, if any) in order, by law, to preserve voter privacy once the ballots are returned to their localities. The SoS office notified EVERYBODY sometime ago (the ECC and both camps) they would be doing this on Friday the 20th.
Friday morning Team Coleman trooped into judges chambers about 9:00am with a Motion for a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) to prevent this. But their timing was so unusual that several 100 of the 933 had already been so redacted.
It was such a surprise (and the real skullduggery seems here) that it was the UPTake's Mike McIntee who first broke the news to Deputy Sec. of State Gelbmann--- and mostly by accident! McIntee called him up and said, "Have you really stopped redacting because of a TRO?" Gelbmann said, "WHAT Restraining Order? Are you kidding?! (puts down phone, yells down the dungeon steps, "Put...the candle..BACK! Put the magic markers down NOW!")
.......about half of the 933 ballots and votes have already had their identifying numbers redacted.
(Gelbmann) said his staff began removing the numbers on the ballots around 8:50 a.m.. When they received the TRO papers at about 9:30 a.m., they halted the redaction effort.
Gelbmann said the court order to begin removing identifying numbers came Feb. 3. The attorney general’s office thought a three-week window to redact the identifying marks was sufficient. So, today was the day. (MN Post)
LOTS of speculation the timing was intended to interrupt the redacting so Team Coleman can claim "unequal protection", "differing standards", "broken rubber", "no way to tell how this all went so we should just reduce Franken's total by -100".
[Comment From annie esq]
Mike, Several of us theorize that Coleman waited until too late to move for the temporary injunction because they did not believe the motion would actually be granted, and this way they can whine about injustice because the redaction has already begun.
MAN! Is this the depth of arrogance or WHAT?
If this is the first evidence (!) of what having Ben Ginsberg INSIDE the courtroom means, well then Florida 2000 has just had jumper cables clamped to the bolt on its neck.
The basis for the TRO by Team Coleman? "Well since the Court on Friday the 13th threw out a bunch of absentee ballot categories and since maybe some of the 933 were in those categories that got thrown out those votes should now be equal protection-wise thrown out too. AND "stipulation with prejudice" doesn't count since the ECC is making new law here."
The request itself stinks like moose poop on ice, steam still rising and ice melting in shallow circle. The mind boggles (and yatzees!) at the effrontery and condescending trumpery and leaves one speechless.
3) THE Response (Lap and Shoulder Harness Required)
One may be left speechless. But not another.
The bloggers climbed all over Team Coleman within minutes:
[Comment From Chris II]
"Any absentee ballot envelopes so identified that the local election officials and the candidates agree were rejected in error shall be opened, the ballot shall be counted, and its vote for United States Senator added to the total votes cast for that office in that precinct" The Supreme court's Dec. 18th order rendered the 933 legal. The end.
What matters is that Coleman dismissed any claim about the 933 WITH PREJUDICE. Where I come from that means he doesn't get to go back and get a do-over on those 933.
But HANDS DOWN the response of the MONTH/YEAR came from where it should have come from: Team Franken.
Where are your donations going (until the LOSER reimburses the ContesTEE after the ECC rules)?
Want to see your donation dollars at work?
You want a lawyer? You should check their written work when they have time to really crunch through facts and law and precedents. Go hear a few in court. Watch the UpTake for reverse knowledge ("What to Avoid in a Lawyer").
But do you want a crackerjack/ "won't get fooled again"/ think on your feet/ command the facts and law/ keen mind and moral outrage in one gleaming laser beam focused through a fist sized diamond really GREAT lawyer? Call David Lillehaug of Team Franken.
The 6 page pdf response opposing the TRO request is here "Contestee Oppostion....": http://www.mncourts.gov/...
Holy Mother of St. Olaf! By the thundering reindeer herds of Lapland! Lillehaug was not just en fuego. He's like the remote picture from the bottom of the blast pit when the space shuttle is just launching. En fuego? His kind of heat could turn a mile high glacier into Lake Calhoun in 10 minutes.
On extremely short notice (like, walk into Court and be told: "take a look at this/ what should we do?" short notice) he turned out a scorching rebuttal that is worth a click of gold to you at the above link.
>Sentence 2: "the motion flies in the face of a stipulation...."
>Sentence 4: Contestant's effort to renege (!) on stipulation.....(and) eviscerate the binding order warrants imposition of sanctions."
(Sanctions: For making such a motion Lillehaug wants the ECC to lay the lumber on the Coleman legal team: a fine paid to the Court; "3 days in the cooler, Hogan!" for contempt; reprimand--"Goes on your permanent record"--by the state bar association; all the way up to and including lifting law license. Sanctions are HEAVY.)
And thats just prelude. Then he gets onto those pesky FACT things of "Factual Background". He runs down all the details of how we got to today, including all exhibit numbers and paragraphs of the stipulations.
Then he gets to the arguments from law in "Legal Background." Lillehaug holds nothing back:
"Contestants seek to breach the Stipulation, defy the Court Order.....and make the Court party to the breach." (YEE-OUCH!)
"Irreparable harm" to voter privacy will occur if motion for TRO is granted...indeed the 933 should never have been marked up in the first place" (YOWSER!)
IANAL but I will poll the house here of those who ARE esquires if they've seen motion language like this before: "This is the Contestants' second, and even more egregious, flip-flop on the 933 ballots." (RECC'D FOR "EGREGIOUS FLIP FLOP"!)
The outraged, compressed fury goes on and on: "reversed course again"... "no basis whatsoever"....."in this case or any other" ... stipulation is not "null & void" --it is fully enforceable and should be enforced against Contestants".....
He caps the climax by going on a doff-my-hat and let-my-jaw-hang-slack-in-awe RANT that would pull Hunter S. Thompson out of a mescaline drug buy:
"Contestants' latest strategy is to attack the legitimacy of Minnesota's electoral system and the decisions of this Court. Until now, that strategy has been pursued outside the courtroom through the voice of a spokesperson. Now, the strategy has entered the courtroom, through this motion.......This is a direct attack on the integrity of the Court and the entire judicial process."
By the robe of John Marshall and the ghost of Daniel Webster! The man can write, preach, proclaim and argue a case....WHEW!
(And a final coda: "Contestee (Franken's side) advised counsel for the Contestant that this motion is baseless and warrants the imposition of sanctions." I think this is lawyer talk for "Your honors, lets take along opposing counsel and step outside in the alley. I'll hold your robes.")
4) Had Enough?
The ECC hadn't. They took the Request for TRO. They took the Motion to Deny the TRO. And then they said, "We will hear Oral Arguments on the motion....Today, 4:00!"
And so it was. Both sides had 10 minutes to open. Langdon went first for Team Coleman...his side "read in the paper that the SoS was going to redact today" (THATS a hell of an argument!)..... we think we want the court to see it our way...... used 4 minutes; NO questions from ECC judges.
Lillehaug for Franken......retells his motion but with gestures (hard to add to his words!)...... "This motion is the next step in attacking the MN election system"....."motion is brought in bad faith"
Langdon (5 min to close) miffed his side is misunderstood in their efforts to aid all MN voters to actually cast their votes for Norm Coleman, real American (certified by Michele Bachmann)...or something. But he WAS resentful Lillehaug could question the "utmost good faith" of Team Coleman in stipulating with prejudice to the counting of the 933. Its just that the Friday the 13th order of the Court had opened the door to overturning that stipulation.......
If reading faces counts for anything the consensus was the ECC judges were.....less than enthralled by Mr. Langdon's presentation or facts. Adjourned right after orals. Decision on TRO anytime.
Saturday Morning round up
- Franken's Team Homework: Build Your Own Universe
Franken's legal team had until 5:00pm Friday to submit/add to/change the list of absentee ballots they plan to use for their case. (The Franken Universe). While I'm positive they made the deadline (after all this IS Team Franken we're talking about, not the Dances of Dunces squad for Norm) there is no link up yet showing exactly WHAT they filed.
- No word as of 6:45 this morning of a ruling from the ECC on the TRO.
- Minnesota Independent has a nice story & transcript of Senator-Elect Al Franken's words on Air America the other day:
http://minnesotaindependent.com/...
- In between thunderclaps witnesses were called and testified: counties of Sherburne (1/2 way between Mpls & St. Cloud; Bachmann 06 district; Coleman 51-30; Elk River), Douglas (W Central; Carlos Creek winery; Alexandria), McLeod (2 counties W of Mpls; ruby-stupid; Glencoe).
- Both the Star Trib and the Pioneer press have decent write ups of the dust up. (Duchschere & Doyle of the Star Trib actually make the front page!.......of the B section) http://www.twincities.com/...
http://www.startribune.com/...
- Jay Weiner at Minn Post continues to run circles around the Star Trib and the Pioneer Press. You can tell he's a journalist because he can say what I spent a whole diary ranting about in a LOT fewer words.
http://www.minnpost.com/...
Looks like about 4 inches of snow last night some nice powder. Son WineRev-ER goes to the MN high school state fencing tournament today. 36 in men's foil so far..... WineRev-ER finished 5th last year as a frosh and he's a LOT better this year so fingers crossed (in a tiny "parry 5")..... I've got the late shift so shower, blog, breakfast, blog, e-mail, blog for a while.....
Hope this will hold you until the ECC comes down with a ruling on the TRO. Thats some of the latest from yust southeast of Lake Wobegon.
Shalom.