Comic Al Franken wins seat in US Senate

Al Franken (pictured), an Emmy award-winning American comedian and one-time regular on NBC's Saturday Night Live, has won a seat in the US Senate. When he began his fight for Minnesota last year, few thought he had much chance of success, believing the madcap excesses of SNL would prevent him from being taken seriously. But he fought a hard campaign for the Democrats and yesterday, two months after the final ballots, he finally emerged triumphant after a series of recounts, winning the seat by just 225 votes.

That said, he is not packing his bags for Washington just yet. His Republican opponent, Norm Coleman, has already vowed to contest the result, which means a lengthy legal battle is likely. Coleman's lawyers are likely to focus on the handling of absentee ballots. He is expected to contend that a small but crucial batch of absentee forms were counted twice during the recount process, while another consignment of about 650 ballots from areas of the state thought to favour him were improperly rejected.

However, as far as the Democrats are concerned, Franken, whose books include Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right, has won and his victory gives them a majority of 58 out of the 100 Senate seats. "While there are still possible legal issues that will run their course, there is no longer any doubt who will be the next senator from Minnesota," said Chuck Schumer, the senior senator from New York.

After leaving SNL – which has seen its fortunes revived during the presidential campaign because of Tina Fey’s wicked impersonations of Sarah Palin – Franken hosted a talk show on the left-leaning Air America radio network, making a point of attacking right-wing radio jocks such as Rush Limbaugh. Sample: "Where did Rush Limbaugh get his statistics? From his butt."