Norm Coleman

After a fierce eight-month voter recount battle in Minnesota, Al Franken's U.S. Senate victory Tuesday hands Democrats a powerful, filibuster-proof majority as they embark on the administration's ambitious initiatives for energy and healthcare reform. The victory followed the Minnesota Supreme Court's unanimous ruling Tuesday declaring Franken the victor over Republican incumbent Norm Coleman by a razor-thin 312 votes out of 2.9 million cast in November's election.

Former U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman of Minnesota said he won't pursue the Republican National Committee chairmanship as long as Michael Steele wants to keep the job. Coleman told the St. Paul Pioneer Press on Friday that part of his decision is based on respect for Steele, despite criticism directed against the current chairman from within the party. Coleman said he doesn't think Steele has gotten enough credit for the work he's done bringing the "tea party" movement and the GOP together.

Former Minnesota Sen. Norm Coleman, who led the American Action Network, an independent group that spent $25 million on behalf of Republican candidates this year, said Wednesday that he would be interested in chairing the Republican National Committee only if the current chairman, Michael Steele, chooses not to seek a second term. "I am not here to do any battles with our chairman; he is a friend," Coleman said in a C-SPAN interview to be broadcast Sunday. If Steele decides to retire from the post, Coleman said "I would say with humility if there was an opportunity to help the party I would do that.

Al Franken, the funnyman who wrote the best-seller "Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot," was sworn in as the junior senator from Minnesota on Tuesday, without doing one single funny thing. Once he was known on the "Saturday Night Live" stage as the lisping, sweater-wearing bundle of insecurities Stuart Smalley ("I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and doggone it, people like me").

Former Vice President Walter F. Mondale came out of retirement for just one week before quietly and humbly returning Wednesday, ushered back by a respectful and even somber Sen.-elect Norm Coleman, a 53-year-old Republican who has been down many times in his political life only to rise again.

Months of tension between Republican Sen. Norm Coleman and his Democratic rival, Al Franken, burst into open acrimony during the last debate of the campaign Sunday night as they traded heated accusations about allegations made in a lawsuit against the incumbent. It started immediately, and Coleman denied taking money or gifts from supporters without disclosing it.

Perhaps no incumbent Democrat was as firmly in the White House sights this autumn as Paul Wellstone. He was a liberal thorn in the side of a conservative administration -- unable to derail President Bush's agenda when it gained centrist support, but nevertheless a certain vote in the Senate against those policies. Against that backdrop, Bush stepped gingerly Sunday into the emotion-laden race for the U.S. Senate in Minnesota.

Al Franken, the funnyman who wrote the best-seller "Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot," was sworn in as the junior senator from Minnesota on Tuesday, without doing one single funny thing. Once he was known on the "Saturday Night Live" stage as the lisping, sweater-wearing bundle of insecurities Stuart Smalley ("I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and doggone it, people like me").

Minnesota Supreme Court justices expressed skepticism Monday of Republican Norm Coleman's claim that thousands of absentee ballots in his Senate race against Democrat Al Franken were illegally excluded. During the hearing in St. Paul, Minn., justices pointed out that Coleman's legal team acknowledged that no voter fraud had taken place. A lower court ruled in April that Franken had won the race by 312 votes.

The comedian's opening act warmed up the crowd, whose laughter echoed inside the cavernous lobby of the University of Minnesota's McNamara Alumni Center. Then the headliner stepped onto the stage, took the microphone in hand . . . and didn't tell a joke. Lately, Minnesotans have been seeing a more serious side of comedian Al Franken, one of the original writers for "Saturday Night Live" and author of the book "Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot."

After a fierce eight-month voter recount battle in Minnesota, Al Franken's U.S. Senate victory Tuesday hands Democrats a powerful, filibuster-proof majority as they embark on the administration's ambitious initiatives for energy and healthcare reform. The victory followed the Minnesota Supreme Court's unanimous ruling Tuesday declaring Franken the victor over Republican incumbent Norm Coleman by a razor-thin 312 votes out of 2.9 million cast in November's election.

Minnesota Supreme Court justices expressed skepticism Monday of Republican Norm Coleman's claim that thousands of absentee ballots in his Senate race against Democrat Al Franken were illegally excluded. During the hearing in St. Paul, Minn., justices pointed out that Coleman's legal team acknowledged that no voter fraud had taken place. A lower court ruled in April that Franken had won the race by 312 votes.

The Minnesota Supreme Court will hear arguments today in Coleman vs. Franken, Norm Coleman's challenge to the 2008 U.S. Senate election in Minnesota. If, as expected, the court rejects Coleman's challenge and confirms Al Franken as the winner, the U.S. Senate should be ready to seat Franken provisionally, even if Coleman vows further legal action and even if the state's governor refuses to sign Franken's election certificate.

A Minnesota court confirmed Monday that Democrat Al Franken won the most votes in his 2008 Senate race against Republican Norm Coleman, who immediately announced plans to appeal the decision. Coleman has 10 days to appeal to the state Supreme Court. Once the petition is filed, it could further delay the seating of Minnesota's second senator for weeks.

A three-judge panel Tuesday awarded Democrat challenger Al Franken more votes in his bid to become Minnesota's next senator, but it will take additional court action to decide the final result in what is already the longest-running recount in the state's history. The panel examined 351 ballots and added the result to previous counts, giving Franken a lead of 312 votes over Republican Norm Coleman. Franken began the day ahead by 225 votes of about 2.4 million cast in November.

The judges in Minnesota's U.S. Senate trial said in a preliminary ruling Friday that Republican Norm Coleman had not yet shown a widespread problem with absentee voters being denied the right to vote. The three-judge panel ordered that rejected absentee ballots from 12 of 19 categories should not be counted in the Senate race. Coleman, who is trying to undo Democrat Al Franken's 225-vote lead, had wanted to count ballots in all but three of the categories.

The judges in Minnesota's U.S. Senate trial said in a preliminary ruling Friday that Republican Norm Coleman had not yet shown a widespread problem with absentee voters being denied the right to vote. The three-judge panel ordered that rejected absentee ballots from 12 of 19 categories should not be counted in the Senate race. Coleman, who is trying to undo Democrat Al Franken's 225-vote lead, had wanted to count ballots in all but three of the categories.

Democrat Al Franken was quickly turned down Monday when he asked Minnesota's governor and secretary of state to issue an election certificate that would let him take office in the Senate. In letters the campaign sent to Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Democratic Secretary of State Mark Ritchie, Franken's lawyers argued that a seven-day waiting period for issuing the certificate after an election has passed and he should get the signed certificate.