The 2004 Washington State Gubernatorial Election: one of the closest elections in American political history. Rife with intrigue, twists and turns, and probably a large dose of fraud, it stands as one of the darker moments in a decade chock full of bad election mojo.
And, apparently, it’s a moment that lives on in Minnesota’s Senatorial election this year. Like Washington’s Dino Rossi (R) against Christine Gregoire (D), Minnesota Sen. Norm Coleman (R) had a small lead over Al Franken (D) on election night. After the initial count, Rossi’s lead was 261 votes, and Coleman’s lead was even narrower: 215 votes. Both races triggered their states automatic recount provisions. Rossi’s lead dropped to 42 votes after the initial recount; Coleman’s lead has widened to 238, but only about 80% of the ballots have been recounted.
The mischief in the Rossi election really got started when the Democrats insisted on a hand recount of ballots. During this process, several hundred ballots were “discovered” in heavily Democratic King County. Along with additional ballots discovered in five other counties, these were enough to turn Rossi’s 42-vote lead into a 129-vote deficit, giving Christine Gregoire the election.
John Fund’s column in the Wall Street Journal notes the tactical similarities between Gregoire and Franken, including demanding a list of names of absentee voters whose votes were not counted. Fund notes how Democrats used this information.
…a partisan hunt for votes. Ryan Bianchi, communications assistant for Ms. Gregoire, told the Seattle Times that Democratic volunteers asked voters if they had cast ballots for Ms. Gregoire. “If they say no, we just tell them to have a nice day,” he said. Only if they said yes did Democrats ask if they wanted to make their ballots valid.
Margot Swanson, a voter in Redmond who forgot to sign her ballot, told me she was contacted by phone and asked whom she voted for. When she said Republican Dino Rossi, the caller quickly hung up. “I puzzled out there might be a problem with my ballot, and I found out there was,” she said. “But I would never have known from the tricky call I got.”
Republicans played catch-up by belatedly using their own phone banks to call voters. But Democrats turned in some 600 written oaths from people declaring how they had intended to vote, and Republicans about 200. Those ballots were all counted, and made the difference in the race.
Al Franken has apparently even imported then-chairman of the Washington Democratic Party, Paul Berendt, for advice. ”What I bring to this effort,” Berendt said, “is that I understand every single step of this recount process and the things that you need to look for in order to make sure that every vote is counted.”
Every vote is counted? Or every vote is produced. Either way, Washington’s disputed election is a gift that just keeps on giving.
