Heffelfinger won’t represent Coleman

Former Minnesota U.S. Attorney Tom Heffelfinger has decided not to represent U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., as preparations are being made for a recount of Tuesday’s race between Coleman and DFLer Al Franken.

Coleman led Franken by roughly 500 votes as of Wednesday. They both received 42 percent of the vote. The result triggers an automatic recount that state law requires when elections are decided by less than one-half of 1 percent.

Heffelfinger, who served as U.S. Attorney from 2001 to 2006 and now is an attorney at Minneapolis law firm Best & Flanagan, said he doesn’t want to get involved in the recount while he leads an independent review of law enforcement planning and tactics for the Republican National Convention (RNC) in September.

Heffelfinger, in a statement e-mailed to reporters by the city of St. Paul, said: