Twin Cities Business Litigation Blog : Minneapolis Business Litigation Lawyer & Attorney : Gavin P. Craig Law Firm : St. Paul, Twin Cities, Minnesota MN

Coleman's attorneys are clearly scraping the bottom of the barrel for votes. They are now apparently arguing the a person who was living in the jail of a county, that was not his home county should have his vote counted. I am not a fan of Norm Coleman, but I think that if the situation were reversed, I would want Franken to concede so the state would have it's two senators.

Coleman's team has already argued that two forged ballots should be counted. Altered evidence, and they were caught, and they want the prisoner vote.   In another developement Coleman might have picked up three votes in an unusual situation. 

Meanwhile, Franken is asking the Minnesota Supreme Court to order a temporary certification pending the outcome of the case, so that Minnesota will have a senator. If Franken was not leading I think this would be an easy call - No. But since he is leading, the argument makes sense. I am not sure that the law contemplates such a thing, and I am not aware of this happening before.Another view of the case is here.

Is the Franken case asking the court to make a poliyical decision?  I can't imagine that the legislature ever thought this would happen, so there is no clear direction for the court. 

And unfortunately it will go on for awhile.

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Minnesota Supreme Court issued its opinion to deny candidate Clark's motion to have a sitting Minnesota Supreme Court Judge removed from the ballot.  This is a continuation of an earlier post.

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 In Minnesota, when a judicial vacancy occurs, the Governor appoints a person to the position until the next election when a successor can be elected.  This happened in the Minnesota Supreme Court and the Governor appointed a well-qualified jurist, Lorie Gilda.  The position is now up for election.

 Usually the person appointed runs for the seat to which they were appointed.  Other candidates can and do file to run for these various judgeships.  In the upcoming election a local lawyer, Jill Clark, is also running for the seat currently occupied by Justice Gilda.  Clark has run for a judicial position before, and lost.

Clark apparently thinks that the best election strategy is to try to get the current justice disqualified.  So, as lawyers do, she sued.  Clark filed her case directly with the Minnesota Supreme Court and argued that Lorie Gilda is disqualified to run for the seat because she can’t succeed herself.  To be kind, this argument is at best a very tortured reading of the statute.  Next she argued that Lorie Gilda, the judge currently in the position, could not be designated as the “Incumbent.”  Not surprisingly, when the case was filed in the Minnesota Supreme Court, all of the sitting justices had conflicts, so a panel of retired Minnesota Supreme Court justices was appointed to hear the case and make a decision.   

 Also not surprisingly, Clark lost.  She then filed a motion to have Justice Gilda removed from the ballot pending her appeal to the United States Supreme Court.  This motion was quickly denied.   The Minnesota Lawyer Blog has an interesting series on the ongoing story. Clark has now apparently filed a motion with Justice Alito of the United State Supreme Court asking for an injunction to grant her the same relief that was already denied her by the Minnesota Supreme Court.

I think Clark does have one interesting point:  Sitting judges are a virtual lock for re-election, so the appointment of a judge to a judgeship effectively eliminates open judicial elections.  While this argument may have some merit, it is a question for the legislature, not the courts. 

The Minnesota Lawyer is following this story closely and has good updates.  I’m sure there will more to this story. 

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