Sen. Amy Klobuchar Photo: Nancy B. Olsen

Sen. Amy Klobuchar teamed up with Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas on Wednesday to introduce legislation that would make it illegal for prisoners to sell ‘murderabilia.” The Stop the Sale of Murderabilia to Protect the Dignity of Crime Victims Act of 2010 would ban “prisoners from mailing any object the prisoner intends to be sold in interstate commerce” and would allow victims of crime to recover damages from the sale of such items.

“As a former prosecutor, I know firsthand what it is like to work with families who have lost loved ones to violent crimes,” Klobuchar said in a statement. “Criminals that commit these violent crimes shouldn’t be able to further profit from their acts by selling items that wouldn’t have any value except for the notoriety of the seller. I’m glad to work with Senator Cornyn on this issue, and proud to continue fighting for crime victims”.

Cornyn added, “It is reprehensible that criminals who are supposed to be paying their debt to society are exploiting their notoriety and profiting from their deplorable crimes.”

The bill would create a system where patients could return unused drugs to pharmacies or law enforcement. Current federal law doesn’t allow patients to bring drugs to pharmacies and places restrictions on bringing drugs to law enforcement.

“Parents know that keeping unwanted prescription drugs in their homes increases the risk that young people will find them, but current law provides them with few alternatives,” Klobuchar said in a statement on Monday. “By making it easier for people to dispose of controlled substances they no longer need, we reduce teens’ access to these drugs and help curb teen drug abuse.”

Klobuchar introduced the bill with Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas.

Cornyn, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, regularly sounded the rallying cry of Coleman’s cause, threatening “World War III” when appropriate and calling for Coleman’s return to the Senate, or at least for his seat to remain empty a good long time — like, “years.”

It took only days after Coleman conceded defeat to Democrat Al Franken for Cornyn to take the Ag committee seat that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell had kept empty, in case Coleman came back. It’s Cornyn’s fourth committee assignment — evidence, says the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram, of how thinly-spread the 40-Republican Senate minority is.

Franken got four committee assignments too, but not Agriculture, where Minnesota’s other senator, Amy Klobuchar, holds a seat (as did her predecessor, Mark Dayton). That makes 2009 the first year since the late Sen. Paul Wellstone joined in 2001 that Minnesota hasn’t had both its senators assigned to what’s officially called the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry.

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas (WDCpix)

At a luncheon at the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s headquarters near Capitol Hill (organized by the Heritage Foundation), I asked Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) if there was a Republican game plan ready when the Minnesota Supreme Court makes its ruling in the contested 2008 Minnesota Senate race — if, as many expect, it decides that Al Franken defeated former Sen. Norm Coleman. Although he cautioned that “most predictions about judicial outcomes are 50/50″ and that he didn’t rule out a Coleman win in the state Supreme Court, Cornyn said that Republicans were ready to back more lawsuits if Coleman lost.

“We’ll do everything we can to support Norm as long as he has appellate remedies to pursue,” Cornyn said. “I’m not suggesting Norm has this plan in mind, because frankly I think he’s hopeful it turns out well at the state Supreme Court.” He continued:

But as a former state Supreme Court judge and as a recovering lawyer for 30 years now, I would tell that if he were to lose, what happens is that the secretary of state and the governor are required to sign a certificate of election. Just as a procedural matter, if — and this is a big if — Norm were to decide to appeal this matter to the United States Supreme Court under the Bush v. Gore (2000) precedent, which says that under the Equal Protection Clause uniform counting standards are a Constitutional matter, that they could appeal to the United States Supreme Court. The justice that’s responsible for that area — I think it’s Justice Alito — could issue a stay in the issuance of the election certificate, and it could be referred to the entire court.

Cornyn wasn’t sure that this would happen.

“I say all this as ‘could,’” he said, “not as ‘will or should.’ It depends on what the Minnesota Supreme Court does. But at the oral arguments, Franken’s lawyers did argue about the applicability of the Bush v. Gore standard. It makes no sense, and it doesn’t meet the Supreme Court’s Constitutional precedent, to say that one local election official can decide by one standard which ballots should be counted and that some official somewhere else could decide by a different standard.”

Cornyn also argued that there was a larger issue at play than whether the Democrats got a 60th Senate seat.

“I’m very proud of Norm Coleman for fighting the good fight to protect the right of Minnesota voters to make sure all legitimate votes are counted,” said Cornyn. “That is the real question here. I realize it’s manifested itself in terms of who actually wins this seat, but I think that should be the focus.”

David Weigel is a politics reporter for the Washington Independent. ]]> http://minnesotaindependent.com/37611/cornyn-i%e2%80%99ll-support-coleman-if-he-appeals-to-the-supreme-court/feed 9 http://minnesotaindependent.com/33736/video-wisconsin-goper-ryan-thinks-franken-will-will http://minnesotaindependent.com/33736/video-wisconsin-goper-ryan-thinks-franken-will-will#comments Thu, 30 Apr 2009 14:15:43 +0000 Paul Schmelzer http://minnesotaindependent.com/?p=33736 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…]]>
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 a pause, Ryan answered, “Yeah, most of us think that is going to happen.” That’s in stark contrast to an ever-confident Sen. John Cornyn, chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, who wrote yesterday at Power Line of the “unfortunate and unlikely event that Senator Norm Coleman loses his legal battle in Minnesota.”

“It’s premature to say that, based on a number of factors,” Pawlenty replied. “We just need more information as to evaluating this case.” Video after jump. 

The state courts might decide he should wait to sign an election certificate until federal appeals run their course, he said. Or federal courts might accept a separate Coleman lawsuit based on equal-protection claims and impose a delay on state court proceedings.

And even aside from those scenarios, the governor said he wouldn’t uncap his signing pen until he sees “how harshly or strongly the issues have been dealt with” by state Supreme Court justices.

The Fix, a Washington Post blog, deemed the performance positively presidential.

Perhaps most impressive was his ability to keep an absolutely straight face during Maddow’s repeated and extended characterizations of the Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee chairman, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, as “gleeful” about the Minnesota Senate seat staying empty.

Here’s the video. If you want to skip Maddow’s intro on the election contest’s status, Pawlenty starts at the 3:30 mark.

If he keeps up the fight, he is likely to lose, unnecessarily deprive Minnesota of a second senator, end his political career seen as a sore loser, and hurt his party in a state that is eager for this fight to be over. His team has talked enough about further legal challenges that if he leaves now, he will get some points for grace. (Needless to say, that sentiment would not be universal.) But this is, I think, the last moment where he can exit with some dignity.

Related:
Give up, Coleman: Quotes from the election-contest courthouse and beyond
More free advice for Coleman from media, punditry

UPDATE after the jump: It was a week ago that Cornyn said an appeal “could take years.”

Cornyn, who is chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, has so far been winning a war of words with Reid over the standoff. Reid backed down from earlier vows to seat Franken after Republicans threatened to filibuster.

The rhetorical art of metaphorical war — a topic on which U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann recently gave the nation a clinic — is likely to ramp up this week as anticipation grows for the impending decision by Minnesota’s three-judge panel in the election-contest lawsuit brought by Coleman.

UPDATE: Cornyn’s contention that a Coleman appeal in federal courts could take years is ricocheting around the blogosphere this morning, apparently because it’s again referenced in Manu Raju’s Politico post today. But Cornyn made that statement a week ago, after the Republicans’ weekly lunch last Tuesday, as Raju then reported. The full quote:

I know it seems it’s gone on for a long time already, but this could go on for a long time. Appeals take months, if not years, sometimes.

When and to whom did Cornyn make the “World War III” comment Raju reported for apparently the first time today? I’ve asked Raju that question by e-mail and will update again here if I get a response.

Cornyn also told Politico that Coleman has repeatedly brought up the possibility that the state will hold a re-vote. The former Minnesota senator has mentioned a do-over election at “different times,” the Texas senator said. Legal experts call a re-do one of the most distant of possible scenarios for resolving the Senate-seat snarl.

The absence from the U.S. Senate of Democrat Al Franken — who was determined to be the winner by 225 votes of a statewide recount that’s been contested by Coleman in a St. Paul courtroom for the last month and a half — was felt most sharply last week as Senate Democrats struggled on votes to pass the omnibus federal spending bill.

He feels like he owes it to the voters of Minnesota and his colleagues here. He realizes how important retaining that seat is to us.

Democrats have taken up talking about the political effect of the vacancy, too — ruefully — but they are not talking about doing anything about it. An attempt to seat Franken ahead of the election contest trial’s end ain’t gonna happen until the courtroom drama is resolved, an occurrence Majority Leader Harry Reid somehow got the idea would happen by about a week from today.

Taking account of the Coleman campaign’s receipt of hefty donations-to-the-limit from a fistful of sitting GOP senators, The Nation puts Republican enthusiasm for Minnesota’s vacant senate seat in high relief:

In effect, key Republicans such as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell are paying $10,000 a piece to maintain their power to obstruct Congress.