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I would like to address the comparisons many have made with Al Franken’s 2008 Senate contest. The following from Wikipedia:

“Preliminary reports on election night, November 4, had Coleman ahead by over 700 votes, but the official results certified on November 18, 2008, had Coleman leading by only 215 votes. As the two candidates were separated by less than 0.5 percent, the Secretary of State of Minnesota Mark Ritchie, authorized an automatic recount stipulated in Minnesota election law. In the recount, ballots and certifying materials were examined by hand, and candidates could file challenges to the legality of ballots or materials for inclusion or exclusion with regard to the recount. On January 5, 2009, the Minnesota State Canvassing Board certified the recounted vote totals, with Franken ahead by 225 votes.[60]

On January 6, 2009, Coleman’s campaign filed an election contest, which led to a trial before a three-judge panel.[61] The trial ended on April 7, when the panel ruled that 351 of 387 disputed absentee ballots were incorrectly rejected and ordered them counted. Counting those ballots raised Franken’s lead to 312 votes.”

Basically, it was a close election result that legally triggered a recount and that those few more (originally rejected) ballots that were included via the legal challenge gave Franken the edge over Coleman.

To say that Franken won after one recount after another (as if it was done until he got his desired result) gave him that Senate seat is false and absolutely misleading. Even though, to be sure, I certainly do not share Mr. Franken’s politics, I’m very surprised with many here who mention simplistic comparisons with him when they obviously have not read about what actually did happen, given the Wikipedia excerpt I quote here.

I recall part of the Franken recount involving the classic "box of ballots found in a car trunk." More recently, it was discovered that nearly 400 felons voted illegally in that election, a greater number than Franken's final margin of victory (and it is highly likely that few if any voted for Norm Coleman, his Republican challenger).

I remain highly skeptical of ANY recount requested by a democrat since they ALWAYS end up winning them, usually by the incremental "count until we win" process. They are either the luckiest people on Earth, or conniving cheats.

Thank you for posting those details. I've been saying the same thing here for two days.

There's a lot of confusion among Freepers about that election because it's pretty much accepted that there was rampant fraud involved. But the fraud didn't involve the recount process at all. It involved questionable voter registrations, and documented cases of felons voting illegally.

It's much easier for a shady campaign team to steal an election before Election Day through fraudulent registrations, and on Election Day through fraudulent voting. Once the ballots are collected it is very hard to steal an election unless it is very close and you can play around with disqualified/contested ballots.