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Al Franken paved the way. Has progressive talk radio become the Democratic Party’s new farm league for the U.S. Senate? Maybe so, if the chatter about Ed Schultz running to replace North Dakota’s retiring Byron Dorgan turns out to be more than just talk.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) covered $500,000 of U.S. Sen. Al Franken’s recount-related legal costs last month, the Associated Press reports. The National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) already made its big payout ($938,000) to former Sen. Norm Coleman’s lawyers in May, so last month it paid out a relative trickle ($8,640). Legal bills aside, a Minnesota [...]

As Minnesota Public Radio’s Tom Scheck puts it, Wisconsin Republican Rep. Paul Ryan has thrown Norm Coleman under the bus. In a web-only interview with Katie Couric — now being circulated by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee — Ryan responded to a question about whether Al Franken will eventually take Minnesota’s second senate seat. Without [...]

With more and more papers — including these nine — calling for Norm Coleman to concede the U.S. Senate race, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee wants to capitalize on what its hopes is growing voter disenchantment with the drawn-out affair. The DSCC is seeking signatures on a petition for Coleman to step down and, [...]

The Federal Election Commission decided Thursday that a Democratic Party group can set up a special fundraising account to benefit Al Franken in his election dispute with Norm Coleman. But the FEC had no opinion on whether Franken’s campaign may also establish an account for the current election-contest phase.

Three Republican groups are telling the federal government they agree with Democrat Al Franken on something: There should be more ways for donors to send more dollars to support the rivals in Minnesota’s ongoing U.S. Senate election contest.

An editor’s note in today’s Star Tribune is the latest sign of the newspaper’s squeamishness about its own reporting of what are now two lawsuits alleging back-channel payoffs to U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman:

EDITOR’S NOTE
The Democratic Senate [sic] Campaign Committee is running TV ads featuring a Star Tribune reporter questioning Sen. Norm Coleman about a lawsuit noted in this report. The video in the ad was filmed without the knowledge or consent of the Star Tribune.

The original video shows Strib reporter Paul McEnroe trying to ask Coleman about the first lawsuit filed in Texas this week as Coleman left a St. Cloud cafe Wednesday. (See the video here. See the DSCC’s ad after the jump.)