Minnesota Recount Update, Not Optimistic

by: tremayne

Tue Nov 25, 2008 at 22:51


Norm Coleman now leads Al Franken by 231 votes according to the Star Tribune which is 16 more than he started with prior to the recounting. Of course the "real" margin has been almost entirely obscured by the more than 3,600 challenges lodged by the two campaigns. Nevertheless, I am not optimistic because county-by-county results show a clear pattern: the candidate who challenges the most ballots in a county is the candidate who has gained votes in the county. Here are some examples:

County Who Gained & How Much? Who Challenged More Ballots?
Aitkin Coleman by 3 Coleman by 2
Anoka Franken by 23 Franken by 30
Becker Coleman by 39 Coleman by 37
Brown Franken by 4 Franken by 3
Carlton Coleman by 23 Coleman by 27
Carver Franken by 8 Franken by 11
Dakota Franken by 13 Franken by 10
Hennepin Coleman by 27 Coleman by 34
Meeker Franken by 43 Franken by 44
Stearns Franken by 19 Franken by 15
Washington Coleman by 12 Coleman by 8

There are exceptions to this pattern, mostly counties with a small number of challenges and very small gains or losses. Two other exceptions are Ramsey County where Franken has one more challenge but has gained 34 votes and St. Louis County where Coleman has issued a 100 more challenges but has gained only 57 votes. And Coleman has issued 80 more challenges overall compared to Franken but with 82% of the recount completed that difference alone won't net Franken enough votes.

Nate Silver's models still show Franken pulling ahead, possibly by 100 votes or more. The idea is that Coleman's challenges are negating clear Franken votes while Franken's challenges are more often to ballots ruled void (double votes, scribbles, etc.). But based on the county-by-county patterns it seems optimistic to me. Tell me I'm wrong, please.
tremayne :: Minnesota Recount Update, Not Optimistic

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Minnesota Recount Update, Not Optimistic | 12 comments
cause/effect? (0.00 / 0)
I am not optimistic because county-by-county results show a clear pattern: the candidate who challenges the most ballots in a county is the candidate who has gained votes in the county

From the point of view of cause and effect, this would be expected.  The team that more aggressively challenges gains the most votes.  This is only discouraging on the assumption there is some other cause for the correlation.

You might be wrong (4.00 / 1)
We have very poor information on a lot of this. The best thing to look at is actually those small counties since we can more easily 'see' the individual challenges through the data.  There is some evidence that Franken is gaining 1 vote on average in a lot of the small counties (e.g. Cass: Franken +3, Coleman -2; Franken challenged 5 and Coleman challenged 3, so even though Franken challenged more, even if Coleman and Franken were only challenging the votes of each other, Franken would be +6 there while Coleman would be +3, a net of +3 for Al).

Additionally, people keep forgetting that we should be EXPECTING Franken to challenge more votes since (theoretically) Democrats make more questionable marks and he's trying to take the lead.

Further, before today, Franken had 1 more challenge than Coleman; Coleman now has 80 more challenges.  Before today, the margin was no less than 210, now it's 231. So even assuming Franken and Coleman make only challenges on each other's existing votes, Coleman got +21 by challenging 80 more ballots, suggesting Al netted 60 today.  When you consider that Franken's team said they were down 84 BEFORE today and with 44% of Minneapolis left to count, the good guys may only be down around 25-30 right now.

Bottom line: the trend I see is that Franken is gaining potentially large numbers of votes in St. Paul, Minneapolis, and St. Louis County. Beyond that, the recount is largely a net neutral (in Republican areas, it's a wash between finding new Republican votes and finding uncounted votes by Democrats who don't know how to mark ballots).  

For those panicking, with more than 3500 challenges already, there will likely be more than 4500 by the end of the recount. If 85% of Franken's challenges are to challenge Coleman votes while 90% of Coleman's challenges are to challenge Franken votes, Al will win.

I can't tell what the heck is going on. (4.00 / 2)


John McCain won't insure children
Are these ballots accounted for in your analysis? (0.00 / 0)
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/...

Franken camp finds 6,400 uncounted absentee ballots

Democratic candidate Al Franken's campaign says it has uncovered 6,400 rejected absentee ballots and will ask a state board to count at least some of those votes.

Campaign attorney Marc Elias said Tuesday that the campaign received the rejected ballots from 66 of the state's 87 counties, according to the Associated Press. In some instances, clerical errors or oversight caused the ballot to be improperly rejected.

Don't count on getting a tremendous boost from those (0.00 / 0)
A lot of those 6400 were rightfully rejected; even Al's campaign said so.  Even if they get in (NOT even close to guaranteed), I bet only 100-300 get in and of those Franken nets 25-30 tops.  Maybe that's enough, I'm not sure.
[ Parent ]
I feel like it's impossible to discern anything any more... (0.00 / 0)
There have been so many challenges at a rate that's been increasing every day for BOTH campaigns... It seems almost impossible to know anything any more and we'll just have to wait until the canvassing board rules on them.

If you want discouraging news, how about the fact that Franken's team says he's 84 votes behind with roughly 75% of the vote counted now... At that rate he'll only make up about 112 votes.  Again, though, it's pretty much impossible to tell with the way challenges are going.

The 75% figure means less than you might think (0.00 / 0)
There is real evidence that Franken will be netting the vast majority of his votes in a few places; most of those places concluded counting 2+ days ago (like St. Paul and St. Louis) while Minneapolis hasn't done much counting in the last day or two (they're still at 56%).  Translation - not all %'s are created equal in this recount. Having 10% done with all of Duluth in is much worse than 10% to go with all of Duluth left for example (I know that's not the case yet, but Minneapolis has a way to go).
[ Parent ]
your logic is off (0.00 / 0)
Those two metrics are not independent. Every time a candidate challenges a ballot, depending on what type of challenge it is, a vote gets subtracted from the other person's total. Thus in county's where you see that Coleman has challenged a lot of ballots, those are Franken votes that were taken off but for the most part be added back on. So you see that coleman has challenged 27 more ballots in Charlton county than Franken, and his total has margin has gone up by 23. That is because Coleman has subtracted about 23 more votes from Franken's total by challenging ballots. Go read Nate's posts again.
I'm thinking you're likely right (0.00 / 0)
Given that Coleman's people are challenging ballots at rates only slightly higher than Franken's, Coleman's challenges would then have to be ruled frivolous in substantially higher proportions than Franken's to save the day. Other than that, even if there were some significant number of viable ballots still remaining to be counted somewhere, which doesn't look to be the case, there's really no reason to assume that in an election this close, those would necessarily turn out to be lopsidedly enough in favor of either candidate to make a huge difference.  
I'm skeptical of the notion (0.00 / 0)
that a high percentage of Coleman's challenges are frivolous, just an attempt to temporarily and artificially increase his margin before those votes get added back in. I don't really have any evidence for this skepticism (nor does anyone for the opposite conclusion) except for the odd (to me anyway) fact that the Franken camp has not said that Coleman is challenging a lot of clear Franken votes. And wouldn't they have if that's the case?

But really, my skepticism just stems from having been involved in dozens of the campaigns over the years and knowing a lot of operatives on both sides. And having worked a half dozen recounts. I don't think this would be a strategy they would employ, simply because they don't think that way. Political operatives are above all else a) practical (they don't do things that don't work); and b) copycats (if something DOES work, they'll do it). So it is highly unlikely one camp would engage in a systematic frivolous-challenge strategy while the other side is not. Just doesn't feel right. And I REALLY hope I'm wrong.

My original guess of a 50-75 vote Coleman win still seems good to me.

Two things (0.00 / 0)
1) they did claim Coleman is challenging legit Franken votes, such as the McCain-Franken ballots being challenged.
2) both sides definitely have vast amounts of  frivolous challenges - evens 5% difference in the type of challenges is significant here.
[ Parent ]
Well, Coleman people are challenging (0.00 / 0)
ballots for some really ridiculous reasons, we know that.  For example, there is video showing challenges against Franken votes simply because the same ballot has a vote for McCain.  The logic is that a voter could not vote for McCain and Franken.  I doubt Franken has been challenging like this.

Link to the video:  http://the-uptake.groups.theup...

[ Parent ]
Minnesota Recount Update, Not Optimistic | 12 comments
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