Election

ST. PAUL (AP) ― It's been two months since the U.S. Senate election that pitted Democrat Al Franken against incumbent Republican Norm Coleman, but it's still impossible to say who actually won.

Their contest enters a new phase Monday when a panel of three judges begins hearing Coleman's lawsuit over a recount that left him out in the cold. Coleman argues that ballot irregularities and improperly rejected absentees are the reasons Franken holds a narrow lead.

But legal experts say it is Coleman who faces the bigger challenge.

That's because Franken is sitting on a state-declared 225-vote lead, giving Coleman two hills to climb.

First, his lawyers have to produce proof of the irregularities and inconsistencies that they're alleging riddled the vote tally with fatal flaws.

Then, if they meet that burden of proof, Coleman must make up enough votes to overtake Franken. But even Coleman's lawyers acknowledge that if the alleged mistakes are corrected Franken also would gain some votes.

"It's an uphill battle" for Coleman, said Ned Foley, an Ohio State University political scientist who's been monitoring Minnesota's recount.

Franken, by contrast, mainly has to argue that decisions made so far -- mostly by members of a state canvassing board that included two Supreme Court justices -- were correct.

Foley notes that while Coleman faces obstacles, he benefits from the fact that the trial is considered a "de novo" proceeding -- Latin for "new trial" -- meaning the judges can make decisions on the facts in the case without being bound by anything that's happened in the last two months of recounts and legal wrangling over ballots.

Coleman's attorneys have stressed this fact.

"You are the single set of eyes to give finality in Minnesota to the election dispute," Coleman attorney Tony Trimble told the judges in a pretrial hearing last week.

Recently, Franken's lead attorney Marc Elias has repeatedly returned to arguing that Minnesota is in what he called a "constitutional crisis" because it currently only has one U.S. senator in Washington. In a separate legal proceeding scheduled for Feb. 5, Franken will ask the Minnesota Supreme Court to order Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Secretary of State Mark Ritchie to issue him a temporary election certificate -- a step both have so far refused.

Coleman acknowledges the desire of Minnesotans "to see this moved along as expeditiously as possible," he said in an interview last week with The Associated Press. But he insists there is a greater value in making sure that the election was conducted fairly.

No one on either side is willing to predict how long the trial might last.

At the end of last week, the judges denied a Coleman request for a sweeping, last-minute inspection of ballots at selected precincts around the state -- a decision that could delay the conclusion of the trial back since Coleman's attorneys said their only alternative now is to issue more individual subpoenas of election officials and election-related paperwork from those precincts.

Whichever candidate loses the trial also has options that would drag out a resolution still more, including possible appeals to the Minnesota Supreme Court, federal courts or even the U.S. Senate.

-------

Norm Coleman was born in New York City in 1949. Al Franken was born in New York City in 1951.

(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)