160px-john_kline_official_photo1U.S. Rep. John Kline wants the Minnesota Supreme Control to declare “no winner” in the election contest that shows Al Franken beat Norm Coleman by 312 votes. And he says he has encouraged Coleman to carry on his court fight.

Kline’s public comments on the Minnesota U.S. Senate race have been rare. But it turns out he has a lot to say:

I have thought it’s important that we know what the legitimate results of the election are. I encouraged [Norm Coleman] to carry this through the courts until we can get as much confidence here in Minnesota and in the nation that the results are accurate.

And frankly, the court’s going to do what the court’s going to do. Supreme courts have a lot of power; they can kind of do what they want to do.

But it seems to me we have 2.9 million votes cast and right now you’re looking at a difference of 300 and small change, there’s not going to be any confidence that we really have a result here.

Especially when there are thousands of disputed ballots, the absentee ballots. I think Norm’s assertion that the absentee ballots were allowed different standards in different counties is absolutely correct. And as long as that sits out there, there’s going to be a great deal of uncertainty about the actual results of the election.

So in a perfect world I guess, I would like to see the Minnesota Supreme Court say there isn’t a winner here. There is not a winner. We cannot declare a winner.

And then I suppose the law would require Gov. Pawlenty to name somebody, to have an election again in 2010.

But this is truly unique. I don’t know that anybody knows of anything like this anywhere in the country, ever, where you had a race this close and no reasonable way to resolve it.

You may recall in Georgia, they had their senate race, Saxby Chambliss had the plurality, a clear plurality, but he didn’t have over 50 percent. And their law requires a runoff, and there we’re done. Had the runoff, results are done, certified, a senator’s seated and they’re off and running.

And we’re still caught here. So I hope that we’ll change our election laws here in Minnesota.

Via Minnesota Public Radio’s Polinaut blog.