| | Franken lawyer slams 'cynical and desperate' attempt to stop vote count
 Al Franken's team is increasingly optimistic the Democratic candidate will prevail in the Minnesota Senate recount, and the campaign's lawyer on Monday slammed a lawsuit filed by Republican incumbent Norm Coleman as a "cynical and desperate" attempt to keep votes from being counted.
Coleman's lawsuit asks Minnesota's supreme court to set a "uniform standard" for absentee ballots a state canvassing board has ordered included in the recount; the Coleman campaign also says it is concerned that some ballots have been counted twice.
Franken lawyer Marc Elias, speaking to reporters on a conference call, dismissed those concerns, portraying them as the desperate gasps of a campaign worried at its declining fortunes.
"They are suing because they're behind," Elias said, reiterating his methodology that shows Franken with a four-vote lead. "The numbers are what they are. ... What we're seeing is a cynical and despearate attempt by the Coleman campaign."
While most counts maintain that Coleman holds an edge of around 200 votes in the recount, an Associated Press analysis from over the weekend found that Franken would make up that gap once the board begins deciding on the challenges. Elias pointed to the article as evidence that the campaign's count was right all along.
There are about 1,000 more absentee ballots that the board last week recommended adding to the recount because they were improperly rejected. It is the inclusion of these ballots Coleman's campaign is attempting to stop -- temporarily it argues, so the court can provide guidance on a unified standard for inclusion.
Such a standard already exists, Elias argued, negating the need for Coleman's suit.
"There is a uniform standard," he said. "There are four reasons for rejecting a ballot and if it doesn't meet one of those four reasons, then it should be counted."
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