Beaten by the clock? Sandy Keith ad could cost Coleman $$$.

Yesterday Aaron Landry at MnPublius noticed that Norm Coleman’s latest campaign ad, a testimonial from former Minnesota Supreme Court Chief Justice Sandy Keith, violates a law that requires a four-second authorization tag at the end of campaign commercials. Break it and you’re supposed to forfeit your statutory entitlement to the deeply discounted rates that politicians customarily pay for advertising. He also reports that the Franken campaign is calling up stations that aired the Keith spot to tell them of their potential windfall.

By Landry’s estimate, enforcement of the law in Coleman’s case could burn up about $1 million in Coleman campaign funds. Glenn Thrush of Politico picks up the story today, but adds this caveat: “The law has never been seriously enforced – and the decision on the rate charge has often been left up to the discretion of individual stations. In 2006, then Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum made a similar mistake, but the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Election Commission declined to force stations to hike.”

The ad is below.

Norm Coleman: “Sandy Keith” (:30)