Jill Lawrence ponders the question here.

Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie reports 26,211 absentee ballots so far for Tuesday’s primary, the most in 20 years. As we learned during the Franken-Coleman saga, absentees are one of the big things that candidates can wind up fighting… Continue reading

Politico reports here on the tea party movement’s difficulty in raising money. For more on this, see WSJ blog and UPI.

The Guardian has this story on a UK Ministry of Justice report regarding the implementation — and non-implementation — of European Court of Human Rights judgments, focusing on one finding that the blanket disfranchisement of prisoners violated their human rights.

The AP reports here on spending in support of their own candidacies by Meg Whitman in the California Governor’s race, Linda McMahon in the Connecticut U.S. Senate race, and Jeff Greene in the Florida U.S. Senate race, among others.

Hear about his plans for new disclosure regs here.

The Hill reports here on a new complaint from the National Legal and Policy Center.

The AP has this report and Politico this one. A press release and statement of alleged violations from the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct may be found here. Update: The WaPo, NYT, and LA … Continue reading

CQ Politics has this report on Tuesday’s Republican primary for Michigan’s 1st Congressional District (currently represented by Democrat Bart Stupak), in which surgeon Dan Benishek led State Senator Jason Allen by just one vote after the unofficial count.

Florida’s primary isn’t until August 24, but it really starts tomorrow when early voting begins, as reported here and here. Florida heavily relies on in-person early voting, with 31.3 voting by this method in 2008 according to the EAC’s … Continue reading

The Hill has this story and the WaPo this one on the new rules, which push back the Iowa caucus to February and require states holding primaries in March to award delegates proportionally (thus providing an incentive for states to… Continue reading

The AP has this story on a federal lawsuit brought by an unaffiliated state rep, asserting that Colorado’s contribution limits discriminate against candidates who aren’t affiliated with one of the major parties.

SCOTUSblog has the latest here. Under the scheduling order, briefing on the appeal won’t be completed until late December — although, as Rick has noted, appellate review of Judge Walker’s decision on the pending stay application will… Continue reading

John Fund argues here that excessive pay for city officials in Bell, California may have its roots in absentee ballot fraud. Whether or not that’s true, he’s right that absentee ballots are “the method of voting most susceptible to fraud.”