ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) âÄî Both sides in Minnesota’s Senate recount trial tried to use Monday’s testimony from a county elections director to bolster their cases. Ramsey County Elections Director Joe Mansky spent most of the day on the witness stand. Under questioning from Democrat Al Franken’s attorney, Mansky expressed confidence in how Minnesota runs elections and in decisions by his office to accept or reject certain absentee ballots. Franken’s lawyer, Kevin Hamilton, asked Mansky if he felt Ramsey County’s election effort was fair, impartial and accurate. Mansky replied yes each time. But Coleman’s lawyer got Mansky to acknowledge some flaws or errors, including some instances where absentee voters had their ballots rejected because of mistakes by election workers. “I think we ought not hold the voter responsible for something that was our responsibility,” Mansky said. Coleman sued to undo Franken’s 225-vote lead. He is seeking to review thousands of rejected absentee ballots; Franken believes a much smaller number should be considered again. Much of Mansky’s testimony covered areas already discussed in the first week of the trial. The Senate trial started its second week Monday with no end in sight, and there are several key rulings still pending that would bring more clarity to the trial’s timeline. The judges hearing the case have not yet indicated whether they’ll allow Coleman’s sweeping reconsideration or opt for the more limited review sought by Franken. Under questioning last week by one of Coleman’s attorneys, Mansky testified that some absentee ballots in Ramsey County were wrongly rejected as election judges were trying to keep up with the crush of ballots in the days before Election Day. But in questioning from Franken’s attorney, Mansky said such mistakes were isolated cases of human error and didn’t create any sort of larger pattern. “Is it fair to say at the end of the day that the system runs fairly smoothly, but not with machine-like precision?” Franken attorney Kevin Hamilton asked Mansky, who replied, “Yes.” After that, Hamilton embarked on a tedious process of asking Mansky individualized questions about more than a dozen rejected absentee ballots that Coleman’s attorneys had earlier in the process objected to including in the count. Hamilton sought to establish that the circumstances that led the campaign to veto the ballots required obtaining information beyond what’s included on the ballot envelope. That runs counter to Coleman’s argument that the trial judges can use the ballot envelope by itself to decide if absentee ballots were properly rejected. When Mansky finished, the Coleman team called to the stand two more absentee voters whose votes weren’t counted. But it wasn’t clear from the testimony whether their absentee ballots were improperly rejected.