It is perhaps the most closely watched post-election election in the nation.

Although several contests remain undecided none have been as contentious-and expensive-as the senate race in Minnesota between Republican incumbent Norm Coleman and his Democratic challenger Al Franken, a former writer and cast member of Saturday Night Live.

Coleman leads Franken by just 206 votes out of nearly 3 million ballots cast.

The razor-thin margin has triggered an automatic hand recount. The state’s Canvassing Board, which is made up of four judges and Secretary of State Mark Ritchie, will certify the results of the election on Tuesday, 24-hours before the recount begins.

But Franken has called on the board to delay the certification process and review absentee ballots that were rejected by state election officials.

“The [canvassing] board must consider and take into account all ballots cast — including validly cast absentee ballots that have been wrongfully rejected,” states a legal memo Franken’s lawyer sent to the board.

Franken’s legal team made the appeal to the Canvassing Board just as Ritchie indicated that Coleman would widen his lead by 9 votes.

Franken was running behind in the race by a little more than 700 votes two weeks ago. But he gained 200 votes a little over a week ago when election officials in Buhl realized they hadn’t immediately submitted results from the election.

Franken scored another 100 votes 10 days ago when an election official in Pine County mistakenly typed in “24″ instead of “124″ for Franken.

Coleman’s campaign manager Cullen Sheehan has been suspicious of the turn of events that have turned out in Franken’s favor.

“We are now seeing huge chunks of votes appearing and disappearing – statistically dubious and improbable shifts that are overwhelmingly accruing to the benefit of Al Franken,” Sheehan said.

Last week, Franken filed a lawsuit in Ramsey County to gain access to lists of voters whose absentee ballots were rejected by election officials in counties across the state. A hearing on the matter is scheduled to begin Wednesday–about 90 minutes after the recount begins in some parts of Minnesota.

Franken’s campaign unsuccessfully tried to get Hennepin County to include in the vote tally 461 absentee ballots that were rejected.

Mark Elias, an attorney working for the Franken campaign on the recount, said last week the “the only way we can ensure people were not disenfranchised is to check the lists.”

Franken’s campaign believes the absentee ballots that have been rejected would help him cut into Coleman’s lead. The campaign says it has obtained evidence that shows hundreds of legitimate voters had their absentee ballots disqualified on “mere technicalities.” Franken campaign officials said election officials in several Minnesota counties voluntarily gave the campaign information about absentee ballots.

On Monday, officials with Franken’s campaign filed a legal brief with the Canvassing Board that contained sworn affidavits from Jessup Schiks, Bruce Behrens, James Langland and Ordell Adkins, all of who voted for Franken via absentee ballot and had their ballots rejected for reasons that included signatures that didn’t match one that were on file with the state or inconsistent mailing addresses.

In the case of Langland, he voted by absentee ballot prior to Nov. 4, in person, at his local election office, because he said he was going to be out of town on Election Day. However, his ballot was rejected due to the absence of a witness signature.

“Dr. Langland did everything correctly,” said Mark Elias, an attorney working with the Franken campaign on the recount, during a press conference Monday in St. Paul. “He actually went to the recorder’s office and asked them to witness the signature. And due surely to human error and nothing more, it resulted in it being rejected.”

Ritchie, the Secretary of State, said the Canvassing Board will consider Franken’s request, but he added that, absent a judge’s order, the recount would begin Wednesday.

Coleman’s campaign, meanwhile, said Franken’s attempt to get the Canvassing Board to include absentee ballots in the recount proves that the Democratic challenger does not have the votes to win the election.  

“The Franken campaign’s decision to demand that the State Canvassing Board accept rejected absentee ballots was a blatant admission they do not have the votes to overturn the re-election of Norm Coleman,” said Fritz Knaak, Coleman’s recount attorney. “However, their public statement that – failing to succeed in this desperate and unprecedented act tomorrow – they will ask the State Canvassing Board to stop the recount is breathtaking in its far-reaching scope that could leave Minnesotans without a senator in January. Minnesotans will not stand for this obvious effort to win through a legal system what the Franken campaign could not win through the ballot box.”

Elias, Franken’s recount attorney, said Franken is not trying to delay the recount. Rather, he wants the board to ensure voters did not illegally have their ballots rejected and in doing so he said the certification of the election results should not be finalized until the issues revolving around rejected absentee ballots have been resolved.  

“We’re going to take this step by step,” Elias said.

But Colleen Murray, Franken’s spokeswoman, contradicted Elias earlier Monday when she told CNN that if the Canvassing Board decides not to count the rejected absentee ballots the campaign may call for the recount to be postponed.

In the past, Franken has dismissed evidence of voter suppression and other election integrity issues as conspiracy theory.

But he shifted his stance on the issue a day after the Nov. 4 election.

He said his campaign was looking into “irregularities”, including some polling places in Minneapolis that “some polling places…ran out of registration materials.”

“Our office and the Obama campaign have received reports of irregularities at various precincts around the state,” Franken said in a statement.

The Associated Press reported Friday that more than 25,000 ballots in Minnesota counties that voted for Barack Obama did not register a vote for either Coleman or Franken, which could be explained by a misreading of ballots by the state’s optical scan voting machines.

“Though some voters may have intentionally bypassed the race, others may have mismarked their ballot or optical scanning machines may have misread them, the AP reported. “A recount to begin Nov. 19 will use manual inspection to detect such ballots.

The Associated Press declared Coleman the winner early Wednesday, but hours later the wire service “uncalled” the race.

“There’s one more critical statistic: About 8,900 people weren’t recorded as voting for president, according to county-by-county turnout estimates kept by the Secretary of State’s Office,” the AP report said.

“That nearly 9,000 people would skip the closely watched race is questionable, raising the possibility that as many as 33,700 ballots might be subject to change in a hand recount. What recount teams will be looking for is whether stray or light marks on ballots signaled a voter’s preference.”