Dem Election Worker: Coleman Camp's Story About Duplicated Ballots Happened -- I Was There
The Coleman campaign could potentially be in some serious hot water in their effort to prove that double-counting of absentee ballots occurred, after it was revealed that they concealed evidence involving the testimony of a key witness, Republican precinct worker Pamela Howell.
But here's the thing about Howell's testimony: The story itself appears to be true. Democratic precinct worker Shawn Isenhart, who served in the same precinct with Howell, confirmed to me that there was indeed a failure to properly label the original and duplicate copies of a few damaged absentee ballots in that precinct.
Isenhart was there when the precinct workers realized what had happened, which was the key event in Howell's testimony. He thinks it happened to around six ballots, but could possibly as high as 15.
These instances of human error, when election workers failed to fully prepare and label the copied ballots, were the first step that created the potential for a very small number of votes to be counted twice during the recount -- or in some cases the opposite occurring, and the vote not counted at all. This was due in large part to the rules that both campaigns had agreed to in conducting the recount, for how to handle these ballots, and which the Coleman campaign has since declared to have been improper and illegal.
However, my own observation after speaking to Isenhart is that this doesn't really redeem Team Coleman. If anything, it shows just how sloppy and reckless they've been in making their case.
As Franken attorney David Lillehaug noted earlier today, Howell was the only precinct election judge that the Coleman camp called to the witness stand, in order to discuss instances of this problem. And now the credibility of her testimony has been seriously damaged.
Team Coleman had their choice of people to call -- for example, they could have called the actual election workers who failed to label the ballots, but they didn't do that. Instead, they called just the head election judge for this precinct, who the Franken campaign has been able to tear down as a partisan witness.
If her testimony is struck from the record -- for a second time, no less, after the judges did it once and then reversed themselves -- they'll be in serious trouble. And if the court goes all the way with what Franken's lawyers want, and dismiss the entire double-counting claim because of misconduct in the trial, it will have been an unforced error of monumental proportions.
(Note: Precinct workers in Minnesota are selected on a partisan basis, and for sensitive tasks such as ballot duplication they are paired up across party lines. Howell, who was serving as the chief election judge for the district, is a Republican, and as noted above Isenhart is a Dem.)
Josh
Elana
Matt
Eric
Problems remind me of the Sauerbrey craziness here in MD a number of years ago when she disputed the results of the gubernatorial election (she is a conservative Republican with the first part of her name fitting her personality). She found various instances of improper voting (people voting who shouldn't have) but she used a very wide brush (her list of improper votes was based on names of voters with the same name as people who died even though those names were very common and so there were plenty of legitimate voters on her list of "fraudulent voters"), and mainly -- there were errors but no pattern. That is, in any human enterprise, even with the best will, there are errors. The real issue is whether the errors bias the results (this is the basis of much of statistics). In the Franken/Coleman battle over these supposed double-counted ballots, it looks like there were errors but that they were neither purposeful nor biased.
February 27, 2009 6:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
You've basically got it right. When we're talking about 2.9 million ballots, there are going to be errors. It's impossible to get it absolutely perfect.
And these errors happen in every single election across the country. We've only noticed it here because it's so close.
But Coleman is simply unable to prove that it happened in a way that ruined him, and the burden is on him to overturn the certified result. And his legal team has bungled it up even worse along the way.
February 27, 2009 7:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Indeed, they have screwed it up. Should have disclosed the R worker and deposed the D worker. If they could have had the D worker back up the story (even for a potential few votes), that could have given their case a bit more legs -- though I don't think that it would have gotten them anywhere close to winning.
February 27, 2009 7:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
The other poll workers had complained about Howell's work, it could be their testimony would be damaging.
February 28, 2009 10:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
Could the Coleman team subpoena Isenhart, or is it too late for them to submit witnesses?
February 27, 2009 7:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Norm Coleman be da man! Part of me hopes this trial never ends, baby.
February 27, 2009 7:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey, I thought this was a liberal blog! How dare you present facts that may actually corroborate a Coleman claim!
February 27, 2009 7:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Facts generally have a liberal bias, but when they don't it's still best to be informed. Anyway, if Howell's planned to tell the "whole truth" Norm's lawyers wouldn't have advised her not to commit her story to paper so she could stay flexible about what she saw when she testifies. That was a worse violation than Trimbel's lie, that at some point the witness was advised that her testimony might need to change to fit Coleman's needs.
February 28, 2009 11:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
That statement about the need to not get tied down to any particular testimony screamed out at me. Sounds like and invitation to prjury. Surprised it hasn't drawn more attention here. I think it's filthy.
March 1, 2009 4:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
I've been thinking about the court's dilemma all day. If I were having to make the decision regarding this, I think I'd toss her and all her "evidence," because I think she's tainted beyond recall. I wouldn't, though, toss the claim that double counting occurred. If it happened, there will be other people who will corroborate. Howell is clearly a partisan hack who can't be believed. What she claims could very well have happened, I just wouldn't take her word for it. What's the matter with Coleman's people? This never had to be a big secret maneuver. People of character will say what's true, and I'm sure MN is full of people with character.
February 27, 2009 8:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Heckuva job, Coleman."
This is another layer on my theme that the puppetmaster's sole goal is to just keep Coleman's team talking as long as possible. To paraphrase from the OJ trial: "If we're still debatin', then Franken be waitin'"
If Coleman was playing to win, the presentation of his case would be prepared, organized, focused, and actually putting forth arguments to convince the judges of something. (Sort of like what Franken's team is doing.) But they are not. They are calling witnesses without knowing what the witnesses are going to say, and offering arguments about evidence they haven't evaluated. That's not inadvertent error or malpractice but a demonstration that they have a fundamental disregard for the outcome on the merits.
Just like Brownie's oversight of FEMA, nothing is working because no one cares enough to try to make it work.
February 27, 2009 8:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
If every error made by election officials could some how be known and counted/discounted the net gain to the vote total difference between Franken and Coleman would be close to zero.
February 27, 2009 8:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
I believe that.
February 27, 2009 9:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
That’s the thing. Coleman’s team has shown that there were likely some errors, but have not shown that there was any bias that would favor Coleman if the errors could be corrected.
February 27, 2009 9:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Possibly as many as FIFTEEN BALLOTS??? That's it?? Fifteen stinking ballots??
Shiiiiiiiit.
February 27, 2009 11:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
"failure to properly label the original and duplicate copies of a few damaged absentee ballots "
What would the claim be, that double duplicates were made and both counted? If a ballot is damaged so that it needs a duplicate, how can it be counted? If it's damaged, it shouldn't be included in a recount unless there is a clear trail showing that its duplicate was destroyed or never attempted.
Too simple?
As for "up to 15" that would go with the statistics at about 50-50 which means 0 net likely votes for Coleman. Still not meeting any burden of proof?
Why is the Court tolerating this nonsense still? Coleman doesn't even have a sound brief much less a sound case. "beyond a reasonable doubt" doesn't apply to his favor here!
February 28, 2009 5:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Howell was lying about something, it was obvious because she was so bad at it. Coleman's supposed mistake in not calling the other witnesses is just too handy, it wasn't a mistake, it was strategy. The question is why?
Maybe Howell didn't really see the error as she claims, but only heard about it. If that's so her testimony was inadmissible hearsay. The story as she told it would also be subject to impeachment by those who did witness it. Maybe she planned to exaggerate the extent of the mistake, or more likely the motivation of those who made it? There is way more to this story, bet the seed corn.
February 28, 2009 10:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
Eric, Is there any reaction to all this from MN voters, or they tuning it out?
February 28, 2009 3:34 PM | Reply | Permalink