David Lillehaug

David Lillehaug

“The odds are that something went wrong with respect to counting.”

That’s what Democrat Al Franken’s campaign counsel, David Lillehaug, said this morning about the prospect of a pending statewide recount in Tuesday’s U.S. Senate election in Minnesota. ”We want to make sure that each ballot that was cast is counted appropriately,” he said.

Lillehaug called the 0.03 percentage point margin separating Franken from Republican U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman “just a hair” and “unprecedented” in Minnesota history. A 1962 recount in the race for governor had a wider margin and far smaller number of votes, he said on Minnesota Public Radio.

Those comments came after Coleman spoke publicly for the first time since Election Night, when he told supporters at the state Republican Party gathering that the emerging results presaged a nail-biter (video). At a morning-after press conference, Coleman said he is “humbled and grateful for the victory that the voters gave us last night.” He acknowledged the possibility of a recount “because of my margin of victory,” but added, “It is up to [Franken] whether [a recount is worth] the tax dollars it will take to conduct.”

Coleman seemed to make reference to the bitterly fought campaign as he offered an Abraham Lincoln quote from the Civil War and urged that “we proceed in a Minnesota manner” in which any recount would be, in his words, “a respectful review.” Expressing doubt that a recount would change the result giving him a slim victory, Coleman added, “I commend my former opponents” — referring to Franken and Independence Party candidate Dean Barkley.

MPR has audio for both Coleman’s and Lillehaug’s comments today at its Polinaut blog.