Minnesota state senate recount
Minnesota has an unusual recount case: one of the election officials took 17 ballots home and burned them. According to the Duluth News, the election judge apparently thought that the ballot papers (all were absentee ballots) were not to be counted at all. Since the Democratic candidate Sparks won by 11 votes (out of 31,000 total), incumbent Sen. Schwab (R) felt she had not had a full count. She took her case to the State Canvassing Board (the Republican secretary of state and 4 judges). The Board credited Sparks with 8 of the 17 destroyed ballots and did not count the other 9. According to this story, the final count was still 11 more for Sparks. Schwab has now filed a court action to overturn the Canvassing Board decision. This story has another explanation of Sparks' 11 vote lead.