The NYT has this story on Jack Chin’s argument that Senator McCain is ineligible to be pressident due to his birth in the Canal Zone. Here’s an excerpt from Prof. Chin’s draft essay, recently posted on SSRN: Senator McCain was … Continue reading
Dan Tokaji
The NYT’s blog has this report on the AFL-CIO’s plans to run ads over the next three weeks in Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin. … Continue reading
The AP reports here on a lawsuit by the Texas Democratic Party, alleging that electronic voting machines used in about 100 Texas counties are prone to undercounting votes. … Continue reading
The WSJ blog has this report. Republican Donald McGahn was named chairman and Democrat Steven Walther vice-chairman. For more, see stories from the AP, CQ Politics, and WaPo blog. … Continue reading
JURIST has this report on yesterday’s opinion from the Ninth Circuit in Nader v. Brewer. The unanimous opinion struck down Arizona’s early filing deadline for independent candidates to get on the ballot, as well as its prohibition on non-residents circulating … Continue reading
See this story from Gannett and this press release, which includes the text of the letter from Senators Akaka, Feinstein and Kerry. The letter opines that “the Hatch Act does not prohibit outside groups, partisan or otherwise, from registering voters … Continue reading
Democracy 21 has posted this letter from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Criminal Division. It responds to an earlier letter from Democracy 21, urging DOJ to closely monitor the activites of 527 and nonprofit groups. DOJ’s reply says “we intend … Continue reading
The Boston Globe has this report. … Continue reading
Today’s NY Times offers this report and the Boston Globe this one. … Continue reading
The NY Times has this report on the DNC Rules & Bylaws Committee decision yesterday to seat the Michigan and Florida delegates with a half-vote each. The WaPo, LA Times, Detroit Free Press, CQ Politics, AP, Reuters, Bloomberg, and Politico … Continue reading
The San Diego Union-Tribune reports here on a bill co-sponsored by Sen. Dianne Feinstein. … Continue reading
Heather Gerken and Bob Bauer have posted this reponse to Thursday’s comments by Bob Pastor regarding Crawford‘s reliance on the Carter-Baker Commission Report. Here are a couple highlights: We remain convinced that the public deserved something better than what the … Continue reading
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has this report on a new state-court lawsuit in Georgia. … Continue reading
Coverage of yesterday’s decision upholding the extension of Section 5 of the VRA may be found in the Washington Post, NY Times, and Austin American-Statesman. In addition to Rick’s post yesterday, Lyle Denniston offers commentary on SCOTUSBlog, saying the case … Continue reading
Bryan Pfaffenberger has this comment on the history of voting equipment, drawing this lesson: “We gave up hand-counted paper ballots (HCPB) for good reason — and resuming their use might be a very bad idea.” … Continue reading
Electionline.org offers this report on voting rights advocates’ allegations that many states aren’t complying with the National Voter Registration Act. … Continue reading
A three-judge panel of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia has rejected a constitutional challenge to Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, as reauthorized and extended in 2006. The unanimous opinion in Northwest Austin Municipal Utlity … Continue reading
Rick Hills has this very interesting post on Riley v. Kennedy, arguing that the “larger moral” in the case is that “[t]he feds should be extra-cautious about messing with state and local governments’ structure.” … Continue reading
The Christian Science Monitor has this report on tomorrow’s meeting of the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee, which it calls “the most delicate moment of the entire primary season.” For more, see today’s stories in the Detroit Free Press, LA … Continue reading
The AP offers this report on how the Obama campaign’s mastery of the arcane delegate-selection rules helped secure his front-runner status. … Continue reading
New EAC Chair Rosemary Rodriguez yesterday issued this statement of policy on public meetings. Here’s the key portion, which goes beyond the requirements of the Sunshine Act: “During my term as Chair, I will require the EAC to make its … Continue reading
The Rocky Mountain News reports here on problems and cost overruns with the state’s voter registration database, required by HAVA. Colorado isn’t the only state to have had trouble with its database. … Continue reading
Wired News reports here. … Continue reading
Janai Nelson of St. John’s School of Law has this post on the Supreme Court’s decision earlier this week in Riley v. Kennedy. She says: “Despite its highly technical facts and likely narrow application, Riley is significant because it limits … Continue reading
And the winners are: Illinois, Minnesota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. For more on this much-needed project to improve the collection of election administration data, see this description from the EAC, as well as this post describing the proposal as it … Continue reading
Following up on yesterday’s posts on the Michigan/Florida delegate controversy (here and here), see this report from today’s LA Times. … Continue reading
Bob Pastor of American University’s Center for Democracy and Election Management, who served as Executive Director of the Carter-Baker Commission, offers the following comments. (I’ve added links to sources he references). After the Supreme Court decision on Crawford, there were … Continue reading
The Columbus Dispatch reports here on a pending Ohio election bill, which includes some but not all of the changes requested by Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner. The bill approved by a state senate committee reportedly would require bipartisan teams … Continue reading
The Fifth Circuit yesterday issued this opinion in Mississippi State Democratic Party v. Barbour, reversing a lower court opinion that had declared Mississippi’s semi-closed primary statute unconstitutional and had required both party identification and photo ID to vote in a … Continue reading
The transcript and other information from the Presidential Primaries Symposium at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, which took place on April 29, may be found here. … Continue reading
A federal court in Tampa has, not surprisingly, thrown out a lawsuit charging the Democratic National Committee with discriminating against Florida voters by refusing the seat the delegates from the state’s too-early primary. CNN has this report and the Washington … Continue reading
Politico has published meeting materials for the Rules and Bylaws Committee Meeting this Saturday on the Michigan and Florida delegations. The materials include staff analyses of both the Florida and Michigan challenges. Update: Taegan Goddard has this preview of Saturday’s … Continue reading
The New York Times has this story on allegations that local election officials failed to record students from the historically black Prairie View A&M University, when they tried to register in 2006. It also reports on a case in Marshall, … Continue reading
Mark Mellman has this post on The Hill, finding a pro-Democratic tilt in the 2004 general election. … Continue reading
Over at the FairVote.blog, Rob Richie has this post on how the primary schedule has elevated the temperature of the Clinton-Obama race, and this one on the National Popular Vote plan and advance registration in Rhode Island. … Continue reading
The Chicago Sun-Times reports here on sparring between the campaigns over the transparency of fundraising efforts. For related stories, see the NY Times, Washington Post, LA Times Blog, AP, and MSNBC. … Continue reading
The SF Chronicle has … Continue reading
Roger Simon of Politico has this story on the upcoming meeting of the Rules and Bylaws Committee, which will consider what to do about the Michigan and Florida delegates. He reports that the committee’s co-chairs, Alexis Herman and James Roosevelt … Continue reading
Shahid Buttar has Part I of III on the Huffington Post, commenting on the Crawford v. Marion County decision upholding Indiana’s voter ID law. … Continue reading
So asks Brad Smith on the Center for Competitive Politics Blog. … Continue reading
The Virginia Board of Elections has released this report and accompanying press release on the problems in Chesterfield County in February’s primary, where some precincts ran out of printed ballots, forcing voters to use scraps of paper to vote. The … Continue reading
So asks the Orlando Sentinel, with regard to 15 Florida counties’ switch from touchscreen to optical-scan voting systems. … Continue reading
The Columbus Dispatch has this report on a “digital pen” that would capture signatures and transmit them to be checked against a statewide voter registration database. … Continue reading
The Hill reports that “Federal agents interviewed staffers for likely Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) as part of their corruption case against Rep. Rick Renzi (R-Ariz.).” … Continue reading
In addition to this insightful post from Rick Pildes, coverage of yesterday’s Section 5 decision in Riley v. Kennedy may be found in stories from the ABA Journal, AP, Jurist, and Press-Register. (Email me if you find more and I’ll … Continue reading
Okay, so maybe its not election law, but those with a fondness for both politics and March Madness may try their hand at filling this bracket from MSNBC. … Continue reading
The LA Times has this report. Could Colorado, Nevada, or New Mexico be the next Florida/Ohio? … Continue reading
The NY Times has this story, focusing on the alleged embezzlement of National Republican Congressional Committee funds by Christopher J. Ward. … Continue reading
The AP has this report on a decision by U.S. District Judge Fred Biery, rejecting LULAC’s challenge to Texas’ method for apportioning presidential delegates. The judge’s order, which begins with some very interesting and unusual autobiographical comments on the context … Continue reading
Last week, the Wall Street Journal published this op-ed by Hans von Spakovsky regarding his actions while at the Justice Department, in response to allegations made in opposition to his FEC nomination. Joe Rich, formerly of DOJ and now with … Continue reading