Franken may be sworn in this week

Senate leaders may swear Al Franken in this week, even as Sen. Norm Coleman’s (R-Minn.) campaign vowed to move forward with a challenge to the Democrat’s victory.

A recount panel on Monday made Franken’s 225-vote win official, as expected, one day before new members are sworn in.

{mosads}But the challenge from Coleman would muddy the waters and could prevent Franken from being seated for the time being.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said the Senate would not attempt to seat Franken on Tuesday and brushed aside any comparisons to Roland Burris, who was tapped to fill President-elect Obama’s Senate seat amid a scandal with Illinois’ governor.

“There are two different laws — Illinois works much differently than does Minnesota,” Reid said. “In Minnesota, Franken has won election. [Norm] Coleman is going to contest that, but Coleman will never, ever serve in the Senate. He’s lost the election. He can stall things, but he’ll never serve in the Senate again.”

Even if he’s not seated on Tuesday, Democratic sources suggest Franken could be seated soon.

But Coleman’s campaign said late Monday afternoon that it would contest the election results within 24 hours.

“The actions today by the canvassing board are but the first step in what, unfortunately, will now have to be a longer process,” Coleman lawyer Tony Trimble said. “This process isn’t at the end; it is now just at the beginning.”

The incumbent will make a statement on Tuesday afternoon, his campaign said.

Franken, meanwhile, declared the recount fair and himself a senator.

“After 62 days, after the careful and painstaking hand inspection of nearly 3 million ballots, after hours and hours of hard work by elections officials and volunteers across the state, I am proud and humbled to stand before you as the next senator from Minnesota,” Franken said.

Coleman’s lawyers face an uphill battle in their suit, and Democrats sought over the past few days to discourage the incumbent from prolonging the already two-month-old drama.

Minnesota state law provides a seven-day window in which an election result can be contested, and the result is not officially certified until the contest is resolved.

As of press time Monday, it was not yet clear whether the Democratic leadership would try to seat Franken some point this week.

A senior Democratic aide left the door open for Franken to be seated later in the week, even without certification. But the aide later stressed that the leadership had not yet finalized its strategy.

If Democrats do attempt to seat Franken, Republicans are promising a filibuster.

Sen. John Cornyn (Texas), the new chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC), said Friday that he didn’t think any Republicans would defect on a filibuster, which would keep Franken from being seated.

Cornyn’s counterpart, Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), suggested Franken should be seated.

{mospagebreak}“With the Senate set to begin meeting on Tuesday to address the important issues facing the nation, it is crucial that Minnesota’s seat not remain empty, and I hope this process will resolve itself as soon as possible,” said Schumer, the chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

Republican Whip Jon Kyl (Ariz.), meanwhile, said he doubts Franken could obtain certification anytime soon, and that without it, a senator shouldn’t be seated.

“If you don’t have that, it’s not even an appropriate thing to bring to the floor of the Senate,” Kyl said.

{mosads}Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said the Senate race “is not over in Minnesota until the people of Minnesota say it’s over.”

Coleman attorney Fritz Knaak, on a Monday evening conference call, labeled Franken’s chances of being seated as “slim to none.”

Monday contained two bits of bad news for the Coleman campaign. Prior to the state canvassing board declaring Franken’s victory, the state Supreme Court denied Coleman’s request to include an additional 650 improperly rejected absentee ballots in the recount.

Those ballots would have gone on top of the original stack of more than 900 other improperly rejected absentee ballots.

The original absentees wound up extending Franken’s lead from 49 votes, but the Coleman batch came from areas more friendly to the Republican.

The 650 ballots aren’t yet a lost cause, though. In his decision, state Supreme Court Justice Alan Page said the question of the ballots is better left to an election contest.

Also at stake in a legal challenge are about 150 ballots that Coleman’s campaign has insisted were counted twice. Trimble also cited 133 votes that were counted without “ballots to support them” and a handful of ballots that weren’t counted on Election Day but were found later.

He also said the challenged ballots weren’t decided in a uniform manner. At the end of that phase, Coleman’s campaign attempted to have the canvassing board rehash decisions it felt were inconsistent.

The board declined.

Even if all those ballots are in play, though, the 225-vote deficit looms large, and Coleman would have to win the pool of votes by a substantial margin.

Mike Soraghan, J. Taylor Rushing and Michael O’Brien contributed to this article.