The MN-GOV race looks headed to a recount. State Democrats and progressives are just coming out of shell-shock. In the legislature Democrats held a 46-21 super-majority in the Senate, and a "just short of 2/3 override" 87-47 advantage in the House. They looked forward to something like those numbers (maybe reduced somewhat in this Republican midterm year) to work with a new Democratic governor in Mark Dayton.
No more defense. No more blocking endless efforts especially by governor Tim Pawlenty to turn Minnesota into a "cold Kansas." It would be 2008 w/ the Obama sweep and Congressional control on a state scale; finally a governor who would sign Democratic, even progressive, legislation.
And now, whiplash. Both houses of the lege turn Republican and Mark Dayton is going to have to play defense, block, veto. Same old same old, but with the roles reversed. Sigh.
But there is a worse case, below the fold. (UPDATED w/ link at bottom to KSTP diary)
Kossack Rieux was the first to write about this and alert us all Lhttp://www.dailykos.com/...
Even the Minneapolis Star Tribune had it on their front page.
http://www.startribune.com/...
Mind you I DON’T know if this will happen, but all the pieces are laying around, all perfectly legal, all just waiting to be strung together.
BACKGROUND
Tim Pawlenty was elected governor in 2002. In both terms he has faced a MN lege either divided between Republicans & Democrats, or Democratic majorities in both houses. Despite a friendly, Midwestern demeanor, he has rigidly held to a position of "no new taxes." Not only at the state level (although very occasionally he has gone along with increases in "fees", since they’re not taxes) there have been efforts to limit local governments, school districts, towns & counties from raising local taxes to make up for the cuts in state support. (Cutting all these state funds has allowed him and many Republicans to run on a "I lowered taxes" platform.)
Now a budget with more outgo than income can only be fixed in 3 ways. 1) More income. 2) Less outgo. 3) A mix of 1 &2. Pawlenty’s adamant stance on "no new taxes" rules out both 1 & 3. Every year then he and the lege struggled over what programs to cut, curtail, cancel. Vetoes and veto threats were the order of the day for 8 years, (backed up by some endless lockstep voting by the GOP minorities.) Sound familiar? The result was a lot of gridlock and often major heartbreak for the Democrats, who saw bill after bill die inches short of becoming law.
Therefore Democrats rejoiced at Pawlenty’s announcement not to run for a third term. Their hopes and energy turned to this year’s governor’s race. Hold the majorities (or assume them), elect Mark Dayton and FINALLY stuff can get done from the left side of the street.
TUESDAY CATASTROPHE
Better than 67% of voters turned out to vote for governor. They split their tickets a LOT however, and the moderates, progressives and liberals tried to set speed records for voting: "the top couple races and I am out of here!" The conservatives stayed and filled in their ovals down ticket. The vote totals here were only 55% of the electorate, and that 12 point drop murdered the Democratic majorities.
Mark Dayton finished 8781 votes (out of over 2,000,000) ahead of Republican Tom Emmer. Emmer ran on a platform of Pawlenty 2.0 the Democrats told each other, but 2.0 on steroids. He ran to the RIGHT of Pawlenty, in essence claiming Pawlenty’s rule had been too moderate, that a $5.8 billion gap in the new budget (total just over $30 billion, next 2 years) can be closed, Pawlenty style, by cuts...and cuts ALONE.
No new taxes (of course). No borrowing. "Living within our means." Name something, anything, the state does and spends money to do and it shall be cut! State aid to schools. State police. State aid to schools (who already have loaned the state millions this year and need it paid back by June 30 to balance THEIR budgets.) Snowplowing (major deal in Minnesota.) State aid to schools. State Parks. State aid to higher education. Libraries. State aid to schools. Road and bridge maintenance & repair (I-35 bridge anyone?). Local government assistance. Funding hospital ERs to take care of people who have no insurance and no place else to go... This list mentions schools a couple times since HALF the state budget goes to school support, and if you are going to cut about 17% of the total budget, half of it can’t be off limits.
Emmer not only ran to the right of T-Paw, he even embraced the Queen of Quackery, Michele Bachmann (his congresswoman.) While MB sees anti-American infiltrators in power, Emmer sees waiters and waitresses often making over $100,000/year due to tips....and tip income is tax free...or over-taxed....or should go to the employer...or not...or the employer should get a tax credit for employee’s tip income... or not. (Emmer had a bad summer campaigning holding all of these positions, often simultaneously.)
DARK SCENARIO
But now the nemesis looms. The GOP Tuesday took control of both houses of the MN lege. A Recount looms in the governor’s race, beginning Nov. 23. How long will it go? No one knows.
But remember 2008. (I know I do.)
Dec. 10 Total, physical recount done. Coleman edge 188. About 6500 ballots state wide "challenged" for cause. Both sides work to reduce these.
Dec. 20. State Canvassing Board begins ruling on about 1350 challenged ballots. Franken edges to lead of 49.
Jan. 3 Canvassing Board opens and counts 954 improperly rejected absentee ballots. Franken edge 225.
Jan. 6 Coleman files for an Election Contest Court.
Jan. 26 Trial begins.
Mar. 13 Trial ends.
Apr. 13 Decision. Franken edge 312.
Late April. Coleman appeals.
June 1 Oral arguments, MN Supreme Court
June 30 Decision.
July 7 Franken sworn in.
If Emmer lets a Recount go forward, challenges ballots, and then files (if still trailing) for an Election Contest Court, the above timeline, although a bit compressed from 2008, will be not all that different. (Some changes have been made to speed things up but we are only talking weeks, not months.) This would be perfectly legal, totally within his rights, legally pure as the (unplowed) driven snow.
On January 4 the new Minnesota legislators are sworn in. And the governor?
The Minnesota Constitution (Art. V. Sec. 2) states
TERM OF GOVERNOR AND LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR; QUALIFICATIONS. The term of office for the governor and lieutenant governor is four years and until a successor is chosen and qualified.
"and until a successor is chosen and qualified."
Those last 8 words have never been tested but the implication is clear. If a Recount is still happening January 3 (4 years to the day Pawlenty was sworn in) he remains governor.
Pawlenty remains governor, with the GOP in full control of the legislature. This is what is keeping MN Democrats screaming in the night. This is what wakes them up in a cold sweat. A group of hyper-caffienated GOP legislators, holding power in both houses (in the Senate for the 1st time since 1972!), decide to run the table, carpe the diem and pass EVERYTHING they have ever dreamed of! After 8 years of battling, Pawlenty has the ability for the 1st & only time in his tenure to sign bills he likes. Only his obvious desire to be done governing and out running for president acts as a counterweight, and no one knows how heavy.
There is no filibuster in the MN legislature (the downside, folks) so a political minority has only as much influence as the majority wants to give them...if any. Can the legislature enact Emmer’s entire platform of $5.8 billion in cuts and balance the state budget? Yes.
Can....and will...Pawlenty sign it?
Can the legislature convene the redistricting panel (with the governor, majority leaders of House & Senate), sit down with maps taken from the Republican Dream Vault and re-draw district lines fixed for the next 10 years? Yes.
Can...and will...Pawlenty sign on?
Can Pawlenty refuse $1.4 billion in federal dollars (with a $430 million state matching allocation, still giving MN $1 billion toward its deficit) on January 15 since it would "promote Obamacare" and the "unconstitutional federal takeover of healthcare."? Emmer has also said he would turn it down. Dayton said he would take it.
Can Pawlenty do this? Who is the governor?
Whenever the Emmer Recount would end, having exercized all the rights accorded to a candidate whose election is subject to a Recount, and he would still lose (and damn it he is NOT going to make up 8800 votes, you can bet the house lutefisk on that!) it could be March. Or May. Or July. Pawlenty can then skip town and hit the presidential sawdust trail (to overtake John Thune in the early polling at 4%). He can enact all of this, toss the keys to Mark Dayton, point to the smoking crater that used to be Minnesota and say, "Its all yours."
LIKELIHOOD
Will it happen? There are ominous signs.
>The Emmer camp has brought in election lawyer Michael Toner. He’s not only competent (see contrast: Coleman legal team) but he sounds as political as hell; political as in Dick Cheney political.
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
>MN GOP chair Tony Sutton (knows hence forward as Sutton the Hutt) has already been so over the top ("We won’t get rolled this time." "fraud and incompetence by election officials") that even the Star Tribune has been moved to print LTEs of protest.
>KMSP-TV is the local Fox affiliate, owned by Hubbard Broadcasting. Hubbard gave over $100,000 to pro-Emmer groups (disclosures required under MN law, a recognized exception of Citizens United) Their newly hired attack anchor Heidi Collins interviewed Secretary of State Mark Ritchie the morning after the election to talk about Recount. She lectured him on election law and the MN Constitution while breaking in on his answers. (The station blogs have been chewing her up on this but still...)
http://www.dailykos.com/...
>There is even the counsel of despair printed in yesterday’s Start Trib.
"If there is to be a recount in the race for governor, I believe Dayton should concede. The Republicans would have complete control for the next two to four years. Citizens could then decide if they liked the outcome."
William B. Maple Grove
The Dark Scenario is that MN could join its fellow Great Lake states (WI, MI, OH) groaning under hard-right Republican rule.
And that is why MN Democrats are drinking hard these days, all across Minnesota and yust southeast of Lake Wobegon as well.
Shalom.