are gearing up for a second big recount in six years and there was a recount in 2004 that i'll talk about later. you know, i believe that the lawyers and campaign managers and data collectors from any race that is too close to call this year, can learn about what did and did not happen here during what's the longest, largest, and most expensive recount in american history, the recount of 2008 and 2009. ..

and coleman had his own gaggle of lawyers, most of whom are minnesota-based except for the election mob and ginsberg who served as coleman's and he had been george bush's main spokesperson during the 2000 recount that was a victory for ginsberg was not. i think to properly attribute the franken victory to mere loitering negates some key other fact areas in his win. one was early in overall preparing for it. to his data collection and analysis he collected. three was fund-raising and four was rapid response to events

that occurred. "the new yorker" -- i got lucky last week had a brief review of of my book and ebro, he wrote, she wrote, wanted it more one of that was a singularity between the minnesota recount of the florida recount. there were some other is out there. one was decided that had one last eight years earlier and was trying to get back at that. but most of the memory of paul wellstone was around this recount as well. senator coleman had been wellstone and they thought the people of wellstone would win. franken's political desperation was wellstone. so wasn't just worried. there is a lot of stuff happening in the truth recount. and while this is not florida, that's the name of the book, that's an inside flag will look at the recount with particular emphasis on how franken's team performed. i think it does detail a template of how to be conducted in hoping the matter what side they're on the people will read it as they do their recounts in

two weeks or in two years. that fall within the context of early wide range of election laws and procedures from state to state. so even though we here in minnesota her recount and thought it was tedious and complicated and outlasted all these weeks, they're different recount was in every state. and so as we get our crystal ball out and see where the recounts are going to happen, don't think what occurred in minnesota will be re-created elsewhere. for instance, nevada is now a battleground. harry reid, challenger share an angle. there's no mandatory recount there to matter how close it is, the loser has to seek the recount and he or she has to decide to pay for it. and if they win come the state comes in and pays for it. so it is that like first half of 1% in its incident. and no matter what the trickery method is, the modern recount is a sort of campaign and over time, in extra innings and it

operates on these levels of legal and technological, political pr against fund-raising and even assert amount of social networking. it seems like only yesterday that it was 2008. but the twitter world was not really that robust in 2008. youtube was. and franken's team used youtube effectively to find and defuse absentee ballot people who cast absentee ballots in order to show that their votes have been counted and it was a sympathetic youtube video. coleman's team used the web to help their voters see if there both up and reject it or not. fortunately we now have a system and secretary of state office all of us can check out at a mutual site. even back in 2008, technology was used and you could be sure any recount this year will have superduper amount to elegy to find voters and for voters to see where they stand. so while those elements that i just mentioned i'd like to talk about each of those in

describing how franken won the senate race by 312 votes out of about 2.9 million cast. and then not i want to talk about some moments of truth for me, either during the recount. from november to a week to july july 209 in the back reporting it in subsequent to franken's swearing-in. there were moments of truth when it relates to franken forces were generally on top of their game in the coleman side was frequently not. i spoke to about 40 players in the recount after franken was sworn in. of all the key players, everyone spoke to me except for senator coleman and ben ginsberg lawyers on both sides did. campaign managers did, operatives on both sides did and i feel that i tried my best to be fair and balanced. between november 2008 in july 2009 i was probably at every news conference. i miss two or three days of the canvassing board which was the administrative word and that one

day of the trial and i should get some battle paid -- [laughter] so, let's start with the preparation and the motivation. it's back in the summer of 2008 and franken's campaign is really going sideways a little bit for allegations that he didn't pay his taxes, which isn't really totally sure. the digging up a full drag and former drug use and senator coleman's former drug use and just a general disarray about his campaign. she is not the horsemen to the democratic party here. stephanie shari'a was brought up in this campaign and right the ship and she is not a secret person because i write about her a lot. a lot of people don't realize the impact she had on this campaign to turn things around. and pretty much by then, by december 2008, marc elias who has been an election expert in washington have been engaged by the franken campaign, not

necessarily for the recount to be a different employer. a lawyer for almost all the democratic senators and all the candidates in his law firm, which is based in seattle and has political arm of washington represented the democratic senatorial campaign committee and barack obama. his mentor, bob bauer is on the white house canceled. one of the younger server on the recount is now in the white house counsel's office. so these people are well-connected. by early october, srinath hired dave wille hage the u.s. attorney in minnesota to nail down the plan. that was done october 15. with three full weeks, but were just not talking about thinking about a plan. the first hours of election night and these are the always hours, is a conference call when it became clear that was going to your recount. kevin hamilton, who is seattle-based in assam law firm got on the phone and he told

everybody, steady absentee ballots. look at absentee ballots. people always screw up, particularly democrats. they're really sloppy voters. kevin had worked on the recount in 2004 where they were at issue. together thing about hamilton is from the moment he landed in minneapolis, which would've been the 11th of november he was thinking about a child. he's a trial attorney. and just keep that in mind when you realize that coleman weikel teamed trial lawyer wasn't tired until three days before the first scheduling meeting on that trial in january and that was joe friedberg has a great lawyer in town, well known, nice man but would never done an election law if he tripped over it in january and suddenly he represented senator coleman and experienced them as planning for two months for this thing. also on the skulls with a man named chris sauter who to me is an unknown person and someone i like and he is arguably the most

experienced and well-trained trainer of volunteers that recount. and it's a recount technician. in the book i call him the carny of recount people because he goes from state fair to say fair, recount to recount any death and operate the first, but he operates the recount. so that team was in place early on. and they brought about 30 recounts, dirty statewide recounts in their ammo. it remains unclear to me still exactly how close we ginsberg was in the count early on. people tell me he was on call. i know he came here in the twin cities soon afterwards at least once. but in the early stages became clear the coleman side believes that local lawyer should do it for pr reasons and because they felt comfortable and also senator coleman felt he was going to win. and i think that's one of the flaws that people who are going to face a recount next week or two weeks should deal with if

you're ahead, do not assume you're going to win. they don't flip often. some people think they be for five times the last 25 years have statewide recounts flipped in the united states, but it can happen particularly with 215 votes. neither fritz cannot or tony trembled with a top lawyers had ever been involved. they've done other recount, but not statewide. tony trembled again a very nice fellow, graduate of william mitchell college of law. i see janice here he's the team. and tony is the mitchell grad. he told me in the back reporting that to prepare for the franken coleman recount, he dusted off -- of those were the words used from his files from the u.s. house recount at david mindy and marc kennedy of the 2000. that was a recount that you're very little attention and firepower from either political parties because it happened in 2004 it was underway and the

nation's eyes were there and although they caters including sauter and ginsberg were in florida. also did not have any of the machinery that are sent a white recount had like a canvassing board and there wasn't any issues of absentee ballots. it wasn't even as close as the second one. you get the early picture. not only was the frank teamed staff to engage, but there was a bitter taste of florida, certain revenge, democrats wanted to come here. he was all franken and the wellstone spirit is hanging over that thing is norm coleman is the symbol of that. so now we move onto the face of the tech knowledge and attention to detail that helps the franken recount effort. this is where sadr comes in. he bitterly wrote the book on it. it's called the primary depending what part of the country you're from. and it lays out for the democrats or anyone who gets a hold of it how you're supposed to recount. the increase is very committed to this notion of the call at

the table. when i talked about the call of the table, talk about regular votes before absentee ballots come in, both at one voting machines that we have a hand recount, the regular ballots are counted by hand, all 2.9 million of them. and if you recall they started on november 19th. 110 locations, 87 counties, 4130 precincts, nettie. so, after election night, coleman is ahead by about 700 or so. but when the dust settles in precincts coming in matters are corrected and the normal organic shaking out of those occurs and happens in every election. we just don't know about it. he's up by 215 when the recount starts. and a lie is for chris sauter, through this carny of recounts tells volunteers may have thousands of volunteers, to make sure you record the call at the table. what dwight mean by the call of

the table? i knew you can't really see it, but these are ballots here. some ballots like franken has cost off people will write and i want him anyway or here both franklin and coleman, that he or she has no next norm coleman. and we've got the lizard people vote. [laughter] brett farb and the flying spaghetti monsters and all those people. so when you -- when the votes are recounted, they are volunteers at the table and they can challenge these votes about voter intent saying no that doesn't look like it's for franken. ultimately all the voter intent stuff is determined by the state canvassing board down the road and it would be in his case, to two supreme court justices to district court justices, secretary of state. but in the trenches as the two parties to challenge the ballots, local officials average hard-working while many people say i think the voter was for

coleman. no, i think is for franken. the franken site had this theory based on sadr's experience at the call of the tables by experienced election officials are generally correct. there's no reason to disbelieve that when mrs. jones or mr. smith says no i'm sorry, the intent was for coleman that they're making enough for cheating or anything. just good honest hard-working minnesota officials. it's kind of like the nfl. you need indisputable evidence to overturn a challenge. and in most cases just keep track of what's going on at the table. so with that in mind, the franken team set up these virtual offices that would have to every county place. 106 sites and they employed what they call a pony express to get all their data back to headquarters in st. paul as quickly as possible. early on the lawyer's monotone said when we get all the ballots, scan them in, turn into pdf, send them to broadband from worthington ordered that it will

do it peterson said hey guys, there's no broadband. [laughter] we can't just shoot at 2.9 million votes just like that. us, the pony express came about. am i won't read it, but there was a guy in the franking campaign named trace, dusty trace. and he was enlisted to assemble these 106 self-contained mini offices in my cardboard cardboard banker's boxes. each side had a rented laptop, a cell modem, two cell phones, dozens of pins, two staplers, five cook words come each of them with templates the chris sauter had devised. every move and every vote. i'm supplies were hanging around for the just completed campaign, but trace told and we went to 15 officemax is about every single clipboard in the twin cities. and his team assembled more than 300 boxes each weighed 20 pounds.

i felt 312 by 12 offices, rose six feet high were placed in trucks that were rented. they were distributed in the voting places are these accounting places. and sauter said he had never seen a recount that well done. and he told that to franken and frank a. whenever he made fund-raising calls told stephen spielberg and barbra streisand, all those people were really well organized. so, that was the foundation of finding out where they stood on day today. the importance of that is really as they say if you don't know where you stand you don't where you're going. if you didn't know you are kind of catching up a little bit you might have other strategies. they're always working on a side strategy for absentee ballots anyway. the coleman team was not as exacting in their people told me that. early on they sort of didn't keep track of the call of the table. some other people were told to keep track. they do feel, but they didn't have an exact date yet. and the book you'll see different key players thought they were ahead, they were

behind, he didn't know. the campaign manager had three different views to which they stood. then all these ballots would return to st. paul on the dusty trace pony express and that's when they would be pdf and they would be tagged by technological people and you would know if those are votes that were crossed out for work cost of her when the canvassing board came about, the franken team could keep a consistent notion of what votes are being challenged and accepted if the canvassing board would forget or not he pointed out. in the income chief justice 9 cents episode cheat sheet and he did a good job on his own. what they were finding though is when you're behind by 215 amherst 2.9 million votes, it's not that hard to swing. if you think about it it's 2.5 votes. votes to come about. now of course senator coleman will find votes. early on they both lost votes because there was overcounting

for dean barkley the third candidate got more than i thought. but the irony is this attention to detail really got the franken people crazy because the secretary of state and the news media was not keeping track of it in the same way. with secretary of state office was doing and we in the news media were picking up was the challenged ballots, not the count of ballots. if you take the challenged ballots out of the count come you don't really know what the count stands. if the coleman team is challenging more, it might mean franken is picking up with those feet in the end they both challenge to many and got out of hand. in any event, there was a discrepancy between what the franken team began to feel the new and what was being reported out of the news media, which led to a story in the star tribune, my former employer in the last weekend of november said with a big honking chart that seemed to be official that franken couldn't win. it was impossible for him to win.

you know those charts you have on a map this is how far you are from indianapolis and kansas city. i couldn't figure it out. well, the problem was that there were these duly nukes conferences between marc elias of of the franken team and fritz cannot of the coleman team. and they were trying to score points in washington and do fundraising. and marc had great connections to the washington loggers. fritz did not. and the other problem was the obama administration was forming. there was a lot of excitement. the economy was willing to take. which people had given their money to candidates. there was campaign from fatigue. that was his full-time job. and on the state's largest newspaper was saying he can't win. so the franken people when because they just thought nobody's going to give us money

for going to lose. they were getting call survey caters in washington like chuck schumer and harry reid loquacious pull the plug here, guys. well, this forced elias to begin revealing that they were catching up. he didn't want to tell people that quite yet. and this created one of the most memorable moments of the recount. and it was a snowy saturday. we're not late into the recount. it's december and the canvassing board has rdb could be an absentee ballot to get heated up. it was like one of those mary tyler moore opening shows for its snowing and snowing sideways and the windows are all frosted. there's only two reporters showed up. rachel stefan berger and i were there. and elias in any part of the news were really proud as could be there have been a news conference on saturday during the blizzard five days before christmas. and i'll elias who is just a

great, funny character of a guy who jingles change in his pocket and his knee is always moving in is a superstitious a guy who moves his arms around like this all the time. he'd been saying for the last couple weeks were hit by two, down by four, we all just kind of said disguise mehdi. he said, al franken will have more votes than norm coleman when the casting board meets next week. we believe firmly that margin will be between 35 and 50. at some point not long after that, al franken will stand before you as a senator elect from minnesota. so he declared that on december 20. i'm sure rachel i shook our heads and there's a conference call but i don't think anybody was on the conference call. i didn't even know the star tribune covered that. he was so filled with confidence. he was just smug about it. and you know, this was the culmination of the sri lanka. early on come of chris saunders

rules, a elegy being done, the pony express. they now felt that they were ahead by 35 to 50. both were deflated the canvassing board met him he was up by 46. and then a couple more cleaning house happened and he was up by 49. ally is joked that he was glad it wasn't 51 because people wouldn't have trusted his numbers. [laughter] for me it was a real moment of truth that i think i should listen to marc elias because he might be right. and the coleman team so we don't know what these numbers are coming from. a mouse another revelation really to the franken side that the team didn't know where these numbers are coming from and that gave them a boost. and then the absentee ballot issue heated up. i think we saw another key moment for me as a minnesotan and really one of the big surprises of the recount for both sides that had to do with fairness and there were two guys who i think -- two men who stood

for that during the recount and what was chief justice back soon but it was marc ritchie, secretary of state. and i don't say this because i like either of them are no either or care about either of them, but they did sort of the right thing. madison had been appointed by valenti. he was republican, chief justice. and in the end, he sided with franken's effort to get wrongly rejected absentee ballot in the count. it was something i turned to republican state absolutely livid because they thought that eric magnuson would side with them. in fact the outside lawyers from both teams thought this would be just like the east coast were the west coast, but the minnesota courts because they're appointed by temple and he republican, marc ritchie because he was the most left-wing official would be for democrats and they would floodtide out that lori swanson is the attorney general would be this way or that way.

it didn't turn out that way at all really. in fact, democrats started disliking marc ritchie could say that is bending over backwards for republicans. they really were looking at not dispensing what are you doing? we need to shut this baby down. in the end, they're talking about how rich he is running for secretary of state padilla swung the election somehow. they looked at the canvassing board in the administrating board before the trial. they looks at 1500 challenged ballots and the board split three to two on 14 of the 1500. which he sided with the left-leaning judges seven times and with the right-leaning blotches seven times. marc ritchie says the book would ever achieve. andersen was republican supreme court justice voted come he voted because he is keeping track of the votes. whatever he says is fine with me. so they agreed 96% of the time these five people who are very different -- appointed by different people or elected.

in some ways i think one of the bigger surprises for minnesotans is these people just kind of did the straight and narrow. but me tell you about another surprise that i'm pretty sure wasn't written about before the boat. that is the role of the obama campaign in the franken campaign. the role was they didn't have any that is one reason why people think franken lost that first time around or franken didn't get the margin that he should have. he certainly lost from the amount of votes that barack obama did by 12 percentage points. obama won state by 54% and franken by 42% and that is a huge come huge gap. he was franken's baggage about it and maybe was obama's understated he was going to win state. but he got 54% and franken got 42%. people know who no say if obama spent an hour at the twin cities airport on sunday or monday,

they send hillary clinton are on the monday before the election. that would've created 2000 votes. and we probably wouldn't be here today. that's really all you needed. but it didn't happen. in fact, just watch and who is a campaign professional as paul wellstone's campaign manager was obama's state campaign manager and he was really, really disturbed that they didn't allow any literature that had franken and obama on the same piece of paper. jeff wood wrote and created one of the door hanging signs that you get the last couple days of the election and it had both bases on not in the chicago people never saw it. [laughter] but it hurt. and turnout was less because there was anticipation about what was going to win. we saw the highest turnout of 78%, but just was seeking 80%. again those two percentage points probably up in the range in the eighth congressional

district would've made the difference. however, obama impact failed to the absentee ballots. there was a tremendous absentee ballots on the part of the obama campaign and we did have the largest absentee ballot numbers in history, 293,000 apps developed. about 10% of our voted with that. that created all the kerfuffle of what is a good absentee ballot and what is and people of questions of how things have changed this election i can answer afterwards. things have changed for the better to undo some of the mistakes and controversies of 2008. but i want to fast-forward and i want to fast-forward to the trial because it took so much time even though i think in the end it wasn't all that portends is franken always one of the canvassing board. the try was really an effort by senator coleman to catch up. he was playing offense but in the end if you recall you started the trial up by 225 but ended the trial -- excuse me,

coleman starts the trial he hired by 225. when it's over he's behind by 312. it was his idea appeared twice the cost and 87 votes because it was franken's effort to get two votes. again, franken's team i think was more prepared, more data center. they had kept track of absentee ballot voters. of course there's a lot at stake. he was going to be not 60th senator. it would be a filibuster proof, the health care matter is coming up as were other things and there was a lot at stake for both sides. this speaks to the most romantic to me and teary and touching exchange of the whole recount. but it also shows the extent to which the franken side was willing to go to get a vote. it involves kevin hamilton who was his lawyer from seattle examining jovian ski, whose the election official for branson

county. i think i might read some of this is people don't mind because it's like a perry mason kind of law and order type thing. exhibit f. 2232 lipton a category by itself. the exhibit was the absentee ballot of statement pass on october 296 days before the election and is polite boyar waited he performed a gorgeously monotones vance v. exactly where the exchange was so sober was soon evident. mr. simmons properly completed the absentee ballot application form. yes, minsky said. a properly completed the ups the ballot or the signatures match, addresses not. yes, szymanski. mr. simmons was a properly registered voter at the time to cast a ballot, was he not hamilton announced quite minsky paused. he looked at it documents. he repeated, do you know who is a properly registered voter? he took his time. is that i don't know that.

the reason i say that as i looked at the voter record here. he has deceased status. what we don't know is since this was pointed out recently if he was eligible on election day. so they didn't know if donald simmons was alive or not on election day. what do we need to figure out, hamilton asked minsky? what they need to figure out is as long as you're alive at some point on election day, your ballot should count. this is not chicago. last night and ski says yes, this is what we need to figure out. hamilton repeats, we need to figure out is a time or date of his death? yes. so, that exchange is over. hamilton was onto the next exhibit, but members of the franken staffer watching the trial on the uptick, the c-span of i call it the psychedelic c-span in the book, but it's a computerized tv channel here. and they quickly ran over dfl headquarters to st. paul, look

for donald simmons death certificate and lunchtime were back in court. manske is back on the stand and hamilton offers exhibit at 3007 into evidence and its simmons just acquired death certificate. hamilton shows it to minsky, let a step back. donald simmons was 65, an african-american guy who had liver cancer and came to get a transplant. his children were here. he really wanted to vote for obama. he loved jazz. his wife was a very nice person. they moved from springfield massachusetts to be near their kids. the franken team in the absentee ballot content found his name subpoenaed to him and mr. simmons called back and said you know, he's dead. they still pursued it, the franken team did. mr. minsky, hamilton says.

this is the same individual were discussing before the break? that is correct he says. can you read the name and date of death of this voter? the persons name is donald peter simmons. the date of death was december 27 mansky said. his vote should count. and mansky says yes. three weeks later with the judges counted the absentee ballots, donaldson's vote was counted. he was one of the 312. so that's what organization is in determination. you know -- most of you know i'm not really a political pundit, but i'm kind of a recovering sportswriter and i stumbled into the story. i have no idea about elections or recounts, but like sports their personalities in politics and that was sort of why i felt like i was back in the sports world there. a lot of guys, that's for sure. there were errors. there were a lot of errors and

big plays. the hamilton symonds moment was a big plate and there were major offenses and defenses errors. their accounts of the table. this wasn't a game and this is not for a trophy. for minnesota it was about statewide identity i ain't because we are a state the worries about how people think about us and how we do and we have this inferiority complex of how we're doing compared to the rest of the world commercially as to the title called this is not florida. and it grew from an exchange between roger magnuson supreme court justice paul andersen. "the new yorker" also said we have a lot of anderson's here in minnesota. we do. there's too in this book and it drove me crazy, too. anyway, magnuson is a very respected lawyer in town. bowtied kind of guy and politics conservative. i met him when he represented the twins when they got out of their lease at the dome in the 1990's.

so i knew him in that realm as well. he had been one of george bush's lawyers in florida before the florida senate and he had won the busch case before the florida senate has spun into the area but the u.s. supreme court could shut the recount found. and roger turner swaggered up to the lectern for the minnesota supreme court on an issue whether to stop the absentee ballots from being counted or not. that's the basic issue. and that's what he wanted and what senator coleman wanted to have done in december. you could feel the judges move up in their seats because he is respected and they thought this is going to be a pretty good show here. and he said, may it please the court twice on december 12, the canvassing work with best of intentions accepted an invitation, we believe, to go to florida and is attempting is that imitation is, given the weather outside the courtroom today and then he was interrupted by paul andersen. he promised himself he wouldn't ask any questions for five minutes.

if you know justice andersen that's very hard for him to do. it took him about the seven seconds. and he was really not. he said council, i know you've been to florida. this is not florida and i'm just not terribly receptive to join us for going to florida and were comparing to that. this is minnesota. we've got a case in minnesota. argue the case in minnesota. that really set the tone for the rest of the recount. this is only december and to establish the fact we were going to do it, you know, on our own. so i think any candidate who faces a recount this election cycle should think about preparations, should think about data, should think about rapid response, idiosyncrasies of the state that he or she isn't. if you add it all up, it might be to victory, but you do need the votes. and they are there or they're not. so thanks for coming.

[applause] any questions? >> i've got a question. i understand why franken won the recount. i understand why franken won the recount, but i'm curious why you think he won the election because he mentioned two things, rumors of drug use, not paying taxes, which was true. his sexist writings which ultimately led amy klobuchar, forgive me of the name, not to endorse him for quite a long time. and then the charges of carpetbagging that he is not lived in minnesota in 30 years. he came back here, establish residency. no other good office experience yet he was able to be someone. i always have been a pretty good senator, but a very good mayor of st. paul. was it because he was identified with bush?

is that why you think -- those are some pretty big garbage he had to overcome. >> well, first of all it was 424216. secondly, the recount is the election. you have won the election. it's the shaking out of the votes. there is no doubt -- i think they're right in chapter five here that franken was a tough candidate and eight democrats in 2008 against a bush ally and republican senator that voted for the bailout. if you run to the polls change dramatically as they voted for the bank to allow. i think it was october 15th. that her calm and even on retrospect some people think it might've been the right vote. the other thing that really shook up the campaign that no one can figure out was the final weekend when there were the

allegations about senator coleman's wife getting money from an insurance company and then: how can a last-minute commercial blaming franken for that and franken have been an unprecedented sunday night tv commercial before the tuesday saying it wasn't me. get out of here, norm coleman is lying to you. i think to answer your question, i think he won the election and the recount. i think that you're right. it was super close and i think that the obama turnout, even though it wasn't as good as it should have been helped franken a lot, too. i don't know if that answers it, but i think the fact that coleman is an incumbent could only get 42% doesn't say a lot about who strength either. or click at 16%, which was the difference. >> in the campaign he constantly identified coleman with bush. and now it's happening as far as

the country has a lot of easy elections, that they are identifying obama with a particular candidate that's running. a matter of fact a lot of these candidates that they don't want anything to do with obama or they don't want to campaign for him or anything. has the president has that much influence? >> asked harry reid, you know. i think so. >> what ever became or what is the story about this phantom votes that were in somebody's trunk in minneapolis and then ended up in a warehouse. were they ever real? >> well, the so-called or two in the trunk of cindy reichardt, they were. and i read about that here. they were votes -- among the recall since i've written this a while ago, but they were votes that were discovered in a precinct. they were totally under control in the right custody.

cindy reichert or somewhat used to be the head of the county election official or minneapolis election official calls the call that office is on the friday night after the election and says we want to count these on saturday because the canvas, the actual counting by each unit has to be done quickly. the coleman people get suspicious. they seek a hearing the next morning before judge kathleen garrett who ends up being on nick canvassing board. in the end, for it tells me that they never said it was in the chart. it was some bloggers who after said it had been in the trunk. temple and he went on fox news and said it was in the trunk. four days after david auer said it wasn't true. so those ballots, that was not true. the franken people call that saturday morning ambush. i forget what it's called. a sneak attack. but it hurt the coleman side

because they got the franken team to realize these guys are going to be on their toes go in after us at any moment and it really was a wake-up call to the franken team that the coleman side was going to be progressive on that score. yes. >> what do you think the chances that senator franken will appear with obama here this weekend? >> i would think that he would, but you know, he doesn't return my calls. [laughter] neither of them. what do you think? [inaudible] >> they think that he will. >> at some point it became fairly clear that franken was going to win, possibly even as early as the canvassing board decision. although you didn't get to speak with senator coleman or former senator coleman and mr. ginsberg, what are the

motivations that cause them to drag it out another six months. a second question, too intent the markets to grow in florida? [laughter] >> i've gotten some calls from people at news organizations in florida. so, sure, that would be great. i prefer it here, but that would be fine. the first question was -- i'm sorry. [inaudible] >> well, yes. i think they jacked it up so franken wouldn't get cd, but i also think they had the right to do it and i don't begrudge norm coleman at all. much of the delay had nothing to do with what he did. i mean, on january 60 appeals the canvassing board effort and for the election contest he was entitled to do that. i must make a really quick. it wasn't his fault the trial lasted seven weeks. the judges were all good people have gotten to know a couple of them gave him this much time as

he wanted in the knowledge for the first couple weeks -- they were catching up on what this is all about. archelaus said something like in virginia they give you two weeks for capital punishment cases. and minnesota gets seven weeks for a recount of a tie for 31. [laughter] winkelman appeals, it takes them a month to determine, which is lightning speed for them. so there was a delay, but one of the things i think and this is maybe a minnesota is known as the longer it took the more people realized it was fair. i read about what i think is one of the bigger mistakes as he attempted to get franken seated before the trial was done. franken and the only decision he really made on the legal front early on, even before coleman appeals, franken -- a life to purchase franklin sands you from the recount, lipsky seated in

washington. franken said no, don't do that. he knew he wanted to run again someday. he knew minnesotans would think it was getting jammed down their throats. while it did take forever for them to get there and it did affect the new congress, i think in the end it was good for the process, but i guess i'm in minnesota now. yeah. >> i got here a little late and i apologize, but in the book you write about what al was doing during the recount kasai was that the person of the toughest job was whoever had to roll them up in a rug so he didn't say anything during the recount. >> i don't write much about it only other than he was fund-raising. it was, you know, it was decided, political and public relations move to have them out of the picture. and some of us thought that

senator coleman beat in the courtroom often was a bad idea because it really showed -- it seemed to indicate he didn't have anything to do. after a while when he was there often, there is a search of pesos to that. and then he was there at some arguments for going on in which his side was getting hammered by for instance the supreme court and the final arguments. so you know, the message from the franken said was he's prepared to be senator. of course the star tribune, vacation early on. but i think in the end of the thing that i'll franken did during his recount was delicate and follow instructions and i think he did the right thing. he delegated to stephanie sherlock she was his surrogate client. and marc elias reported to her. and they briefed franken every night either by phone or in-person and he had them over to the house a lot. if you remember, when the trial

started he made some appearances where he met with mayors and that sort of stuff to show he was still around. but i don't think that they really had to roll him up in a carpet. i think he was chomping at the bit to go to washington. i don't think he had much -- he wasn't available to us at all. the one long interview i had with him came in january when they were trying to establish the fact he was going to be kind of senatorial. yes. >> you commented on the ballots in the trunk. there's another set of ballots from the city of minneapolis that were never located. >> right, 100 or two of those. >> have you been able to find those? the >> i have them in my trunk. [laughter] i wasn't asked to find them, but the judges ruled that they were valid votes. and this was sort of, if you followed, if you're recount junkie there were five

envelopes, one of five, two of five, three or five, four of five and five of five. the number one is missing. there's a theory wouldn't count them one, two, three, four, five, without one. this is where he has his tv moment and he shows how tides x envelopes can be slippery and it's possible someone had five of them and one of them slipped away. 132 votes were counted that night. and the judges ruled as did the recount rules say that if they had been counted on that night and there was prime evidence they existed, then they should count. for now, the 132 haven't been found. i believe there were 70 and roseville as i recall that also went missing. and those 132 were important to franken. he had a net of about 46. early on after that saturday

morning sneak attack was also the issue of the kuomintang accusing franken of wanted to rid the church because it was at the university lutheran church of hope on campus and alia said we need to go everywhere, dig into the basement and it became a big kind of -- no, those dollars were found but they were counted. yes. >> 's if the election -- was there any provision of the recount in senate had passed, the term that coleman had if it had gone into january what would've happened? could polity have appointed somebody? >> it did happen on the day that they counted the first round of absentee ballots in january 3rd, norman coleman's term expired. then our seat was vacant. and there were some states in

which you could have attempted to be seated. and the senate seat senators. and so marc elias attempted to get al franken there. and it's possible that the supreme court somewhere could've said yes, he can be seated and will let the u.s. senate seat them. our supreme court didn't allow that. they waited many weeks to say no to that. and so we didn't have a senator from january 3rd until july 7. >> the governor can't appoint somebody -- >> not under those circumstances. and this leads to the question of whether we should have some sort of provisional feeding here in minnesota and louisiana they did and that caused a major controversy. this may be about eight or 10 years ago. and i believe that we should, you know, if it looks like he's won the recount and the canvassing board has certified he's gotten the most votes, i

don't see why not. and then if the coleman contest would've overturned it, then norm coleman would get to see. but we were with just one senator for seven months, six months. >> do you have any thought as to why norm coleman did not appeal to the u.s. supreme court? >> i'm not a lawyer either, but the people who've read the opinion, the state supreme court opinion that the one person, william mitchell said it was unassailable, the opinion the minnesota supreme court was so tightly written that it was a part. both the trial court and the supreme court both acknowledge there were no people protection issues in this recount, like bush v. gore. there weren't any federal issues that seem to rise to it. at that point i write in the

book that they sort of knew what was coming because of the way the supreme court argument went. when coleman opened his laptop and read it himself and his own, he said that that i'm done. some other people the phone tried to say as the ascendant here. he said come on, guys, there isn't any need to do it. so there just wasn't an issue there to bring. >> sorry i'm late. maybe already addressed it, but i'm interested in your take on the performance as secretary of state barbara chi who has been accused in this election year by his opponents as being party to a variety of fraudulent or coalition during this process. tell us what you think about how we conduct did -- [inaudible] >> well, i like laurie a lot, but i did talk about that. and really what i said was that he was so fair that it was the democrats who are more angry than the republicans.

they thought that she bent over backwards to be fair. and the challenged ballots there were 1500 saturday counted. there was 96 percentage rate of agreement across the board of the five canvassing board members. there's only 1432 votes in which he voted seven times with andersen and 977 times with karen and cleary. so i don't think that there was any way he could have been any fairer really. there's no indication he cited the franken at all even though he did appear with franklin on trent franken and from campaign experiences before the election. i've heard people say the election was stolen, but it was stolen in plainview with 12 judges, half of them appointed by republicans. and so, i think marc ritchie did a fine job. and again i don't know him. i've never had dinner, pages watched him. i was just in seattle and met

the elections officials they are. and ritchie is respected around the country for his attempts to be more modern and change the system. a lot of the things we've changed in our system here and absentee ballots since 2008 for something that ritchie wanted beforehand, but temple and he vetoed some of those. so it's not an endorsement or anything, but i think they did a fair job. >> okay. thanks everybody for coming. >> jay weiner cover the 2008 u.s. senate election and recount firm may impose.com where he was the recipient of the free mac award presented by the minnesota journalism center for his coverage. for more information visit jay weiner.com every weekend, but tv brings you 48 hours of history,

biography and public affairs. here's a portion of one of ourth programs.nd >> why are white people o calle caucasian? have any of you asked yourselves that? of do you know why? know. and this was when they're fresh was still happen. the russians in chechnya and in the chechnya and caucuses were having tremendous struggles. so why are white americans called chechens?hens? well, i did find the answer.r answer took me to germany. it took me to germany in theme 18th century.n the 18w the idea of phrase was invented in the 18th century.acs it doesn't go back to antiquity. there were not white people in antiquity. but since so many people thought that, i thought i should addres it. so my vote actually starts with,

the greeks and the romans and their commentary on the people who became europeans.ho b and what the greeks and the romans discovered were people who lived in various ways forho the greeks when they talked about what we call culture. and for the romans who board in various ways because the romans weren imperialists and were vey interested and he was a good fighter and who could help himep you had to be vanquished. i followed this german idea into the united states via not in the style, who is a french intellectual and thomas carlyle, who was a british intellectualle and ralph waldo emerson. so i spent a long time withh wa ralph waldo emerson, who was the kind of genius at night 10th

century white race theory. ce ralph waldo emerson did not have a great deal to say about black people, but he had a lot to say about white people. now in the 19th century, the thh atl prevailed that there were many great races. so they were people who were considered way. nsideredould question their whiteness. very clearly the irish were white.white this very clearly people descended from english people or scottish people were white, were german people. but they belong to different races. they were white, butel the blone two different races. so for instance, the irish catholics were thought to belong to the celtic race. and people descended from english people were thought to belong to the saxon race.

and the saxons were better than the celts. it was not until the middle of it w the 20th century, which many of us remember vividly that the id of one e big white race came into being in which everybodyry who was why it was the same as everybody else. and it's not an accident thatele ened happened through politics. it happened to the national mobilization of the great the depression, the second world war and the federal policies crafted after the second world war. white race is an idf base in politics. >> to watch this program in its entirety, go to booktv.org. sibley type the title or the

authors name of the top left of the screen and click search. >> next, live from the opening of this year's miami book fair international, for president george w. bush presents his recently published memoir, decision points. ♪ ♪ >> next, live from the opening of this year's miami book fair international come of former president george w. bush presents his recently published memoir, decision points. these ♪ ♪ ♪

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