Category Archives: election law biz

“Barton Gellman Joins Brennan Center in Fight for American Democracy”

Release:

Today journalist Barton Gellman joins the leadership team of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law as Senior Advisor. He will work with the organization’s experts to respond to the threats of abuse of power and the assault on democratic institutions that may follow the presidential election. 

Gellman’s article about the weaponization of the Justice Department is the cover story of the current Atlantic. He is stepping down as a staff writer there to join the Brennan Center. A multiple Pulitzer Prize winner, Gellman is the author most recently of Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency and Dark Mirror: Edward Snowden and the American Surveillance State, both published by Penguin Random House. He is a visiting lecturer at the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs. 

Gellman’s prescient 2020 Atlantic cover story issued an early and influential warning of the risks that Donald Trump would seek to stay in power even if he lost. Before The Atlantic, Gellman was a Washington Post reporter. In his 21 years there, he served as a correspondent in the Middle East as well as a diplomatic, legal, and military correspondent. He anchored the team that won a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the revelations of Edward Snowden. Previously he was awarded Pulitzer Prizes for his reporting on Vice President Cheney and as part of the team covering the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Gellman served as a fellow at the Brennan Center a decade ago.

In his new role at the Brennan Center, Gellman will collaborate with Brennan Center experts on strategy for the pre- and post-election period, including public strategies to anticipate, prevent, and address autocratic initiatives in the next presidential administration. The Center is a leading national voice on democracy issues including election integrity, safeguarding election officials, voting rights, and presidential emergency powers, among other topics….

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“Adav Noti Named Executive Director of Campaign Legal Center”

Release:

Campaign Legal Center (CLC) is pleased to announce that Senior Vice President and Legal Director Adav Noti has been named the organization’s Executive Director, effective January 1, 2024. In this role, Adav will lead CLC’s programmatic activity and operations as CLC executes a multi-faceted strategy to protect our democracy during a pivotal election year. 

The change in management structure allows CLC’s Founder and President Trevor Potter to devote more time to external priorities critical to CLC’s success. Potter remains president of CLC, and Paul Smith continues to serve as CLC’s senior vice president advising on litigation strategy. …

Congratulations!

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Jeff Wice: “John Flateau: Election and Redistricting Pioneer Passes”

The following is a remembrance from Jeff Wice:

New York and the nation lost a voting rights pioneer and leader last week. Dr. John L. Flatueau, a professor at CUNY’s Medgar Evers College, passed away suddenly on December 30th. He had a long and distinguished career in New York’s academic, government, and political worlds.

Dr. Flateau chaired CUNY’s Medgar Evers College Public Administration department, directed the Dubois Bunche Center for Public Policy, and served for a period as dean of the college’s School of Business and Office of External Relations 

Perhaps most notably, Dr. Flateau was the lead plaintiff in a landmark 1982 federal court case that successfully challenged New York’s delay in redistricting the state legislature. As a result of the 1980 Census, New York State had lost five congressional districts. In Flateau v. Anderson, John and a group of plaitiffs charged that the state legislative  lines enacted in the 1970s needed to be redrawn before the 1982 elections (and not six years later, as the then Republican state senate leadership insisted was permissible under state law). In Flateau, the court ordered the state legislature to redraw both the state’s congressional and state legislative district lines in a timely manner in 1982.

Dr. Flateau continued to provide key leadership on census and redistricting issues.  He was a member of the New York City Districting Commission in 2002-2003 and then its Executive Director in 2022-2023.  Most recently, Flateau was a member of New York State’s Independent Redistricting Commission. He participated in a Commission meeting just last Thursday.

Over his career, Dr. Flateau served in numerous other government positions. Among his roles, he was a member of the New York City Board of Elections, State Senate Deputy Secretary for Intergovernmental Relations, Chief of Staff to Mayor David N. Dinkins, Senior Vice President and Chief Diversity Officer for the NYS Empire State Development Corporation, and Executive Director of the NYS Black and Puerto Rican Legislative Caucus. He was active in local politics and managed several campaigns.

Dr. Flateau was a graduate of New York University (BA) and the CUNY Graduate Center (MA and Phd). John is survived by his wife Lorraine and sons Marcus and Jonathan.

John Flateau was a prolific leader, mentor, and dedicated public servant. His mentorship of so many students and government workers became legend. Dedicated to a complete census count and fair redistricting, John’s imprint on New York will endure. And he will be missed by so many. As a memorial notice by Medgar Evers Colleges read, “May Dr. Flateau forever rest in power.”

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Funeral services will be held at 10:00 AM on Wednesday, January 10th at the Bridge St. AWME Church, 277 Stuyvesant Avenue in Brooklyn, NY.

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Eugene Mazo: “Remembering Morris Kramer”

The following is a guest post from Eugene Mazo:

Morris H. Kramer, the plaintiff in Kramer v. Union Free School District No. 15, 395 U.S. 621 (1969), passed away on September 11, 2023. I got to know Kramer toward the end of his life, after writing about the history of his case for Election Law Stories, the book I edited with Josh Douglas in 2016. I’d like to offer readers of the blog a short remembrance.

Kramer’s case challenged a New York law that required citizens in some of the state’s school districts to own or lease taxable real property or have children enrolled in the public schools before they were eligible to vote for their local school board. Kramer failed to satisfy these criteria. He was single, lived in his parents’ home, and had no children.

In Kramer, the Supreme Court held for the first time that a statute granting the right to vote to some citizens while denying it to others had to survive an exacting standard of review. The Supreme Court would henceforth apply strict scrutiny to any laws that discriminated between different classes of voters. While the one person, one vote cases of the early- and mid-1960s halted numerical vote dilution, they offered no guidance on which citizens should be admitted to the franchise in the first place. This was Kramer’s contribution.

Kramer’s case marked the closing chapter of the Warren Court era. Chief Justice Earl Warren handed down his majority opinion in Kramer a week before he retired. When the decision was announced on June 16, 1969, it made the front page of The New York Times.

The case was argued by Osmond Fraenkel of the ACLU, a fact that always displeased Kramer. This was because the ACLU had originally failed to take his case. The ACLU also never invited Murray Miller, the lawyer who handled the case below, to the Court’s oral argument.

In its opinion, the Supreme Court described Kramer as a “31-year-old college-educated stockbroker who lives in his parents’ home,” “has no children,” and “neither owns nor leases taxable real property.” As such, his “attempts to register for and vote in the local school district elections have been unsuccessful.” I taught the casefor years and always had fun with these facts. I’d often ask my students, “So, how many of you still plan to live with your parents when you’re 31 years old?”

After I got to know Kramer better, however, I began to develop a different view of his case. Kramer was a deeply principled person who had been a quiet activist for most of his life. He was intelligent, and he was committed to improving the world. He was well-known on Long Island and in his local community as a “voice of the people.”

Born in the Bronx, Kramer was the youngest of three children. In school, he officially changed his given name, Moses, to Morris, though his friends (and I) always called him Mitty. By coincidence, Kramer’s date of birth—November 6, 1934—happened to be Election Day.

In 1947, Kramer’s parents decided to build a summer home on Long Island and purchased a plot of land in Atlantic Beach, a hamlet just west of Long Beach and east of what is now Kennedy International Airport. The Long Island Herald described it as “a desolate spit of sand jutting out into the Atlantic Ocean, with a patchwork of modest homes, a bar where New York City mafia dons liked to lay low and a post office.”

After completing his Army service in 1956 and finishing his bachelor’s degree at Syracuse in 1958, Kramer moved into his parents’ summer home. It was located at 1632 Park Street, in Atlantic Beach. That was his address when he registered to vote in 1959, when he was denied the right to vote for the school board in 1965, and when he died earlier in 2023. For 65 years, Kramer had lived in the same house.

From Atlantic Beach, Kramer commuted to Manhattan for a few years while he worked in the financial industry. Former solicitor general Rex Lee once called Kramer “the bachelor stockbroker.” But selling stocks constituted a very small part of what Kramer did. He was also a teacher as well as a well-known environmental activist on Long Island. Safeguarding the environment was a goal that was as important to him throughout his life as protecting the right to vote.

Kramer developed strong ties to his community and was part of the fabric of his town for more than sixty years. His urge for belonging is what propelled him to file his lawsuit. What Kramer could not predict, of course, was how his yearning to participate fully in his community would thrust him into the national spotlight. His journey from local activist to Supreme Court plaintiff gave him a voice. In 1992, he ran for Congress. Later, he became a publisher author. And rather late in life, at age 49, he got married. His wife, Ronni Kaman, survives him.

Mitty Kramer was a character. He was warm, curious, and gregarious. He was interested in the world and its affairs. He read The New York Times daily and followed the Supreme Court closely throughout his life. Though not an academic, he was surprisingly knowledgeable about the basics of election law and read the work of several scholars in our field, a fact that always pleasantly surprised me. Every so often, I would get together with him for dinner. The photo below is of us at a Chinese restaurant on Long Island during the summer of 2018.

For me, Kramer’s life served as proof that ordinary Americans are capable of accomplishing extraordinary things. When I taught his case, Kramer would often visit my class. As our discussion of Kramer v. Union Free School District No. 15 wrapped up, I would ask the students if they had ever met the Supreme Court plaintiff, much less one whose case was argued back in 1969. Of course, they hadn’t. Then I would call Kramer from my cell phone and put him on speaker phone.

Kramer was always kind to the students. He patiently answered their questions, offering his New York accent as proof of his authenticity. One time, a student asked him whether he had any parting advice. Kramer thought about it, and finally said, “In life, you will all have ups and downs. During these moments, remember this: The Constitution is your best friend. Hold it near and dear to your heart, and it will guide you.” The students swooned. Some had tears in their eyes.

I called Mitty Kramer as soon as I got back to my office and asked what prompted this sentiment. And he told me that it came from his heart, and that this was how he honestly felt. It was very endearing.

Morris H. Kramer (1934-2023) was born on Election Day in 1934 and died on 9/11 in 2023. He was an American hero.

May his memory be a blessing.

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Very Sad News: Gerry Hebert Has Passed Away

Leading voting rights litigator and champion, and overall mensch, Gerry Hebert has passed away. (I had mentioned on this blog his illness last May and was glad to have had a chance to talk to him and learn how much he appreciated hearing from everyone during his illness.)

Here’s the Campaign Legal Center notice, where Gerry worked after a career that included both the DOJ and his work as a private attorney as “the Bailout King”):

Today, the democracy community lost one of its greatest leaders, J. Gerald (Gerry) Hebert, a fierce defender of voting rights and a titan of election law. Our thoughts today are with Gerry’s wife, Victoria, his children and grandchildren, and the many friends and colleagues who adored him.  

Gerry served as the executive director of CLC from 2004-2018, retiring from the organization in 2021. Under his leadership, CLC expanded its litigation practice and grew its staff and resources to increase the organization’s ability to advocate on behalf of voters.  

Gerry was deeply committed to mentoring young lawyers. In addition to serving as an adjunct professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center, he built a robust intern program at CLC that continues today. In 2015, Gerry also led CLC in creating the Voting Rights Institute (VRI), a partnership with the American Constitution Society and Georgetown Law. The institute provides opportunities for law students and graduates to learn how to litigate voting rights cases.  

Gerry Hebert speaking with the Capitol Building in the background

Gerry Hebert speaking in front of the U.S. Capitol Building on June 24, 2009.

Gerry’s arrival at CLC in 2004 was preceded by an illustrious career at the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), where he served as Acting Chief, Deputy Chief, and Special Litigation Counsel in the Voting Section of the Civil Rights Division. While at the DOJ, Gerry served as the lead attorney in numerous voting rights and redistricting lawsuits, including several cases decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.  

CLC is profoundly grateful to Gerry for his service to American democracy, to voters, and to CLC and its mission. His legacy will continue to live on through the many students and colleagues he has trained to fight on behalf of voters.  

CLC staff will remember Gerry fondly for his wonderfully unique sense of humor and wit, his enthusiasm for life, his love of the law, his taste in wine, his ability to tell a great story, his musical talent, his dedication to his family, and his lifelong commitment to justice and equality.   

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“Scoop: Why Biden’s team soured on Dems’ election lawyer”

Axios:

The big picture: The split between Biden’s team and Elias — who had represented the DNC since 2009 — reflects a larger fight within the party on the best legal approach to expand and protect voting rules.

  • Elias argues Democrats should be fighting on every possible front — filing a flurry of lawsuits and exerting public pressure through the media.
  • Biden’s team, long guided by lawyer Bob Bauer, is concerned that while Elias’ approach may be emotionally satisfying and make for good headlines, it can backfire with the current conservative makeup of the judiciary.
  • The president’s team wants to be more selective in picking legal fights, especially going into a 2024 election that could be especially litigious.

The intrigue: Beyond the philosophical disagreements, Biden’s team became fed up with Elias during the first two years of the administration.

  • Elias often did not consult the DNC or the White House before filing lawsuits affecting voting rights and election laws in key states and at times disregarded their concerns with cases, Democrats familiar with the internal deliberations said.
  • Biden officials found out Elias had filed some lawsuits only when he announced them — often on MSNBC or Twitter….
  • Zoom in: Bauer and Elias faced off last year during the negotiations on strengthening the Electoral Count Act, the law that Donald Trump tried to get Mike Pence to exploit on Jan. 6, 2021.
  • Bauer had helped craft the bipartisan bill behind the scenes.
  • Elias was openly critical of the proposed bill, writing: “Lacking precision in critical areas, the bill feels less like the product of legislative compromise and more like something constructed in a law school faculty lounge.”
  • Many people involved in the negotiations felt that Elias’ tactics were more grandstanding than constructive.
  • His public critiques frustrated some senators who co-sponsored the bill — including Mark Warner (D-Va.) — given that Elias also serves as their campaign lawyer. Warner’s office declined to comment.
  • “Thank god we got that through, no thanks to Marc,” a Democrat involved in the negotiations told Axios.
  • “Bob Bauer was a constructive and insightful sounding board for the senators as they developed the proposals, while Marc Elias’ contribution was serving as a Twitter troll who tried to undermine the effort at every turn,” said one Senate aide.
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Now Available: Jacob Eisler’s “The Law of Freedom: The Supreme Court and Democracy”

Jacob Eisler’s new book is out today. Here’s the description:

The Supreme Court has been at the center of great upheavals in American democracy across the last seventy years. From the end of Jim Crow to the rise of wealth-dominated national campaigns, the Court has battled over if democracy is an egalitarian collaboration to serve the good of all citizens, or a competitive struggle by private interests. In The Law of Freedom, Jacob Eisler questions why the Court has the moral authority to shape democracy at all. Analyzing leading cases through the lens of philosophy and social science, Eisler demonstrates how the soul of election law is a battle between two philosophical understandings of democratic freedom and popular self-rule. This remarkable book reveals that the Court’s battle over democracy has shaped how Americans rule themselves, marking election law as the most dramatic judicial intervention in constitutional history.

You can find the book’s full introduction on SSRN. Review copies may be requested here.

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Election Law Academics Update

Here’s my yearly roundup of election law academic hires, promotions moves, visits, accolades:

Wilfred Codrington was promoted to associate professor of law at Brooklyn and awarded the additional title of Dean’s Research Scholar. He will be visiting at Texas A&M Univ. School of Law in the spring. 

Joshua Douglas will be visiting at St. Louis University.

Justin Levitt has returned to LMU Loyola Law School from serving as the White House’s inaugural Senior Policy Advisor for Democracy and Voting Rights.

Thessalia Merivaki will be Associate Professor at the Department of Political Science and Public Administration at Mississippi State University. (August 15)

Gene Mazo will be joining the faculty of the Thomas R. Kline School of Law at Duquesne University August 1, as Associate Professor of Law and Political Science, with a joint appointment in the law school and political science department. (August 1)

Michael Morse began as assistant Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania’s Carey Law.

Derek Muller joined Notre Dame Law School as a Professor of Law.

Mike Parsons will be teaching an election law course at William & Mary Law School for Fall 2023 while continuing his private practice at Parsons Law PLLC.

Michael Pitts was recently awarded an endowed professorship, the Cleon H. Foust Professor of Law at the Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law.

Chris Seaman was named the Robert E.R. Huntley Professor of Law at Washington and Lee.

Joshua Sellers joined University of Texas Law.

Franita Tolson is now Interim Dean at USC Law.

Sam Wang is now the founding director of the Electoral Innovation Lab, a newly independent organization. The Lab’s mission is to build a practical science of democracy reform. Prof. Wang will continue his research and teaching at Princeton.

Congratulations all!

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Sending Healing Thoughts and Strength to Gerry Hebert

Our friend Gerry Hebert, with a long and distinguished career in voting rights at the Department of Justice and at the Campaign Legal Center (not to mention his role as “Bailout King“), is ill with brain cancer. Jerry is a very fine lawyer and teacher, and an even finer human being. I wish him a full and speedy recovery so that he can get back to mentoring the next generation of voting rights lawyers.

I learned of Gerry’s illness when I spoke to him yesterday, and he told me how much he appreciates all of the words of encouragement that have been sent his way during his treatment. You can learn more about Gerry’s progress and condition by reading his latest Caring Bridge entry.

We wish you all the best Gerry!

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