A Common Ground Democracy essay on why, contrary to some recent assertions, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. would not be the “Condorcet winner” in a well-designed Condorcet-based electoral system.

In South Dakota, reformers have gathered far more signatures than needed to get a measure on the ballot in November that would create a Top Two open primary, much like CA and WA use. Those signatures now have to be validated. I prefer the Alaska model of a Top Four primary, but it’s impressive to see how much primary reform is becoming a matter of focus in many state ballot measures for this fall.

NYT on an FEC advisory opinion that candidates can raise unlimited sums for issue advocacy groups working on ballot measures.

The Federal Election Commission quietly issued an advisory opinion last week allowing candidates to raise unlimited money for issue-advocacy groups working on ballot measures in elections in which those candidates are on the ballot.

The opinion, issued in response to a request from a Nevada-based abortion rights group, could significantly alter the landscape in the fall in terms of the capacity that candidates aligned with these groups have to help them raise money.

The decision applies to all federal candidates, but with a presidential election taking place in six months, the biggest attention will fall to that race. If Mr. Biden can solicit money for abortion-rights ballot measures, he can add to an already-existing fund-raising advantage that his team currently has over Mr. Trump. . . .

The advisory opinion means that both Mr. Biden and former President Donald J. Trump can raise money for outside groups pushing ballot measures. In the wake of the repeal of Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision, abortion ballot measures are expected to be a key focus for Democrats this fall.

“I think it’s quite significant,” said Adav Noti, of the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center, calling it an enormous change from prohibitions put in place by the landmark McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill in 2002.

Detroit News on Democrats’ arguments that recent Republican lawsuits in Michigan have the political aim of sowing doubts about election integrity.

On Monday, lawyers for the Democratic National Committee, which is working to reelect President Joe Biden, said two suits filed by the Republican National Committee in Michigan in March were part of “extensive” and “wide-ranging” efforts to make people believe the upcoming election will be unfair. . . .

The Republican National Committee filed a lawsuit on March 13 in Michigan’s Western District federal court, saying Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson had failed to maintain “clean and accurate” voter registration records and allowed dozens of counties to have more active registered voters than adult residents.

Then, on March 28, the Republican committee submitted a separate suit in the Michigan Court of Claims, asserting Benson, who is a Democrat, had improperly issued guidance telling clerks to presume signatures submitted for absentee voting were valid. . . .

As for the voting registration records suit, Democrats said in their brief, the court had “recently disposed of a similar case involving the same basic allegations” and there “is nothing unlawful about Michigan’s voter-roll maintenance program.”

“Contrary to the RNC’s rhetoric, the true threat to our electoral system comes not from voter-roll maintenance like Michigan’s, but from baseless lawsuits like this one,” the Democratic lawyers wrote in their Monday brief.

Interesting story about a Missouri county party claiming the authority to “vet” Republican candidates and bar them from running as Republicans if they fail its test.

In March, the Vernon County Republican Committee filed what is known as a writ of mandamus through their attorney, Mark McCloskey, to, in effect, compel the Vernon County clerk, Adrienne Lee, to do what they believe to be her public duty.

In the filing, the plaintiff maintains that, just like a club is allowed to determine who its members are, the Vernon County Republican Committee is “solely responsible” in the county for determining who may run for office under the Republican banner.

The county clerk, they insist, went beyond her authority when, in February, she took the filing fees from several candidates who were rejected by the committee and told them that their names would be placed on the Republican primary ballot in August.

The committee’s interpretation of state law is that, while the county clerk can take a filing fee, those checks are then passed on to the party committees. They argue that it is ultimately up to a the political parties — Republican or Democrat — whether to accept or reject those fees and accept or reject any particular candidate. In this case, they did not accept those candidates and did not cash their checks. Thus the candidates’ names should be taken off the ballot, the committee argued.

“The whole purpose of the vetting program is to verify that people who run as Republicans adhere to Republican values and principles and aren’t merely putting an ‘R’ behind their name so they can get elected,” McCloskey told The Star. “We believe the courts have backed us up — that a party should have the exclusive right to determine who gets to run under that party’s banner.”

Politico. Of course, these moves to impede Kennedy’s ballot access and attack his candidacy are a product of winner-take-all electoral rules. Under, say, ranked-choice voting, there wouldn’t be the same incentive to stop minor party challengers. There is a… Continue reading

WaPo reports that the share of Black adults who say they’re certain to vote in this year’s election is down sharply from 2020 — and down by more than the analogous share for all adults. Lower turnout is always a… Continue reading

Charis Franklin has written this Note for the Fordham Law Review. Here’s the excerpt: The Voting Rights Act of 1965 (“the Voting Rights Act”) is one of the primary vehicles by which plaintiffs receive injunctive relief ahead of elections. More… Continue reading

Politico: North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum on Sunday supported the election fraud allegations made by former President Donald Trump, claiming on CNN: “I think it’s clear that there’s vote-buying going on at a scale like we have never seen before.”…… Continue reading