Sen. John Ensign on the Senate's Wild First Day

HANNITY: Joining us now, tonight, with more on this chaos in the Capitol, Nevada Republican Senator John Ensign.

Senator, welcome back to the program.

JOHN ENSIGN (R), NEVADA SENATOR: Always great to be with you.

HANNITY: We appreciate it.

I guess, look, there was a case that involved the late Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Supreme Court case, and the Supreme Court held that Congress must seat any candidate who meets the constitutional requirements for office.

And with Blagojevich having not been indicted, this is only a criminal complaint, it seems to me that there is no justifiable reason not to seat him.

Your thoughts.

ENSIGN: Well, it's obviously a complicated case and really who blew it were the Democrats, especially in Illinois. The Democrats, you know, did not want to be associated with Blagojevich, and what they should have done is taken the power away from the -- from the Democratic governor to appoint a senator.

I -- personally don't think a governor should be appointing senators in the 21st century anyway, but, but they should have called a special election, but the problem is they were afraid that a Republican would win a special election there, and they didn't want to take a chance of that, so they did not take the power away from the governor, and then the governor did his constitutional responsibility.

And I -- I think you're right, Sean. I don't know that there's any way to not seat, you know, this senator. I -- or this proposed senator according to the law.

HANNITY: Well, hang on a second. But -- over the weekend on "Meet the Press" Harry Reid was very confident and he was out there saying without any equivocation whatsoever, we determine who sits in the Senate, he said. We do that.

Now, the question I have and maybe this is -- you can only give me a speculative answer is what is Harry Reid up to and where is Barack Obama?

We don't hear about his position defending Israel against Hamas, not a strong enough position for me, and we don't hear about him -- this is his old seat.

What do you think Harry Reid is up to?

ENSIGN: Well, I think that, first of all, the Democrats are very embarrassed by Blagojevich. And there's no question that they want to try to distance themselves, so, you know, trying to seat a senator who is appointed by them is very -- by him is very embarrassing, and that's why the Democrat-controlled Illinois legislature should have done the right thing and stripped Blagojevich.

HANNITY: Yes.

ENSIGN: . of this power so that they would have a special election, but the problem is, is that the Democrats were -- you know, they were really caught in a bind because they didn't want to be associated with Blagojevich, but they also didn't want to take a chance of losing a seat with a special election.

HANNITY: Yes.

ENSIGN: But as tainted as this whole issue was, it really should have gone to the people of Illinois.

HANNITY: Absolutely.

ENSIGN: . to take out any kind of a cloud away from this thing.

HANNITY: Well.

ENSIGN: And, you know, most likely a Democrat would have been elected anyway, it's a fairly blue state.

HANNITY: And -- the Democrats.

ENSIGN: But they should have been decided by the people of Illinois.

HANNITY: And the Democrats backed off and now regardless of what happens criminally to Blagojevich, politically, I think he should be impeached for the things that he had said, that he's quoted as saying in this criminal complaint.

Let me move on to -- Minnesota and -- Alan's friend Al Franken here for just a second.

ALAN COLMES, CO-HOST: Good friend.

HANNITY: But you know.

(LAUGHTER)

HANNITY: But we have 25 precincts now that have more ballots than voters who signed in to vote. The state Supreme Court Justice Barry Anderson acknowledged, quote, "very likely there was double counting." He's on the canvassing boards.

We have the issue of, quote, "the lost 133 votes," and in one case the -- canvassing board acted one way on the issue of lost votes, and that favored Franken, but when it favored Norm Coleman, they acted the other way.

So there's been incredible inconsistency here. So I -- you know, I can't understand how anyone can consider seating anybody until these issues are resolved by the courts.

Your thoughts.

ENSIGN: Well, I think I have a little moral authority on this particular issue. In 1998...

HANNITY: I know that you do.

ENSIGN: In 1998 Harry Reid and I had a very close race. It was less than a tenth of a percentage point. We had a reasonable recount. There were a lot of things that I could have pursued at the time, but I just felt that at the time that I should have, you know, conceded the race.

For one, I did not think that my chances -- I didn't think the issues were big enough to overturn the election. In this case, this is -- this race, by percentage, is 10 times closer than my race with Senator Harry Reid in `98, and there are a lot more irregularities.

There are a lot of legal questions that need to be answered, and -- to just go and say OK, I'm going to concede the race, I think would be a mistake. I said from the beginning, right after the election, that, you know, the whole process needs to play out to make sure that every vote is counted, that no voter is disenfranchised because, Alan -- and Sean, a bigger question that is at issue here is Minnesota had the largest turnout of any state by percentage -- of any state in the country on Election Day.

That's a great thing.

COLMES: Hey, Senator.

ENSIGN: We don't want to discourage people from voting by saying that your vote didn't count.

COLMES: Isn't this about counting every vote? And isn't this about challenging ones that are in question and making sure that everybody does get counted? And it turns out that as of now, having counted all the votes, Al Franken, 225 votes ahead, one could -- I guess we can still dispute some of those votes, perhaps, but.

ENSIGN: Yes, this is.

(CROSSTALK)

COLMES: . isn't that what this is about?

ENSIGN: It's not only some of those votes, but there may be a lot of votes that were double counted, and that's the problem. If you double count some votes, that makes other votes disenfranchises.

COLMES: How many do you think were double counted?

ENSIGN: Well, you know, that's -- unclear at this point, but there may be a couple hundred votes that were double counted, and it makes a big difference. In races, out of 3 million votes, we're only talking a couple hundred votes. And by percentage, that is incredibly, incredibly close.

COLMES: Now isn't it possible.

ENSIGN: Very rarely.

COLMES: Yes, go ahead. Go ahead.

ENSIGN: I was going to say, very rarely in a case like this in a recount, do you ever see the votes flip like it did, but that will tell you how many irregularities there were in this race.

That's why in Harry Reid's and my race on election night, I was 408 down. After the recount it was 428 votes. And that's the way most recounts are.

For this actually to switch like this, that tells you there are a lot of irregularities.

COLMES: Do you.

ENSIGN: And -- we should take the time to make sure that this race is counted correctly so that every vote in this race.

COLMES: Are you.

ENSIGN: . is not disenfranchised.

COLMES: Are you accusing Al Franken of stealing this election?

HANNITY: Yes.

(CROSSTALK)

ENSIGN: No.

COLMES: I think the question was asked to the senator, not to my co- host Sean Hannity.

HANNITY: Yes.

COLMES: Senator, do you think Al Franken is stealing the election?

ENSIGN: I think that there may -- whether it's Al Franken or some people, I think that they're certainly trying to persuade some of the election officials to do things in a way that may -- may not be ethical, and that's why I think that the courts really needs to take a hard look at this and make sure that politics are taken out of this, and that were -- things are done in the right way.

COLMES: Let me take another pass at that question. If Al Franken is seated, do you think the election will have been stolen?

ENSIGN: You know I think it's too early to say. I -- like I said, I -- I think it's very important whether it's incompetence. You know in the race with Senator Reid and myself back in '98 there was a lot of incompetence especially around Reno, Nevada with the election.

COLMES: But I'm asking you about this election.

ENSIGN: Some.

COLMES: I want to know if you think this is going to be a stolen election.

ENSIGN: I know but sometimes -- and that's what I'm saying, is sometimes it is incompetence more than it is fraud or stealing an election that needs to be straightened out by the courts, and that's why I think we need to go to the nth degree to make sure that this election is decided in a fair manner.

COLMES: All right. In terms of Burris, I agree with you. I believe he should be seated, but doesn't he have to be certified by the Illinois secretary of state legally for that to happen?

ENSIGN: Yes, and I'm not sure that a court is not going to force him to certify, and -0 until that happens, I think that the Democrats do have a legal leg to stand on, but once that happens, I think it will be very difficult not to seat him, and -- you know I would have loved to have seen a special election there just to make sure the people of Illinois decided the race, but that obviously didn't happen. It's not going to happen.

COLMES: By the way, Dianne Feinstein says he should be seated. Dianne Feinstein.

ENSIGN: There are -- you know -- sure, and there -- and she's one of the few Democrats, I think, that's come out so far.

This is an embarrassment for the Democrats. If -- this was a Republican, it would be embarrassing for the Republicans, but the Democrats have been very embarrassed by Rod Blagojevich, and just as we have been by some of the shenanigans the Republicans have done over the last few years, but this is.

COLMES: Right.

ENSIGN: This is their time to be embarrassed.

COLMES: Senator, thank you for coming on. Appreciate your time.

ENSIGN: Thank you.

COLMES: Thanks very much.

ENSIGN: (INAUDIBLE) with both of you.

COLMES: Thanks so much.