Policymakers and election officials are rightly racing to prepare for unprecedented levels of absentee voting this fall.  But it is also essential that we ensure a robust capacity for in-person voting this fall.     Back in June, I explained why… Continue reading

The Secretary of State in MA recently certified that a ballot measure asking voters whether they want to adopt RCV had qualified to be on the ballot this fall. Voters in Alaska will also have an opportunity to… Continue reading

Glad to see more support for my view that, for this fall’s election, Congress should move back the dates in the Electoral Count Act that govern the Electoral College process. From today’s Washington Post: Second, Congress can take a simple… Continue reading

Sixteen days after Election Day, the winner of the Democratic primary in NY’s CD #1 has now been determined. The race involved 36,500 absentee ballots, which, as a result of NY laws on absentee ballot casting and processing, accounts for… Continue reading

We are now two weeks out since New York held its primary elections. As this WSJ story reported, officials this week just began opening nearly 400,000 absentee ballots cast in that election. In one closely contested Congressional primary, for CD… Continue reading

Good Bill Galston piece in the WSJ today (behind a paywall, I assume). Here’s an excerpt of one suggestion Galston makes: Beyond these steps, America’s elder statesmen must do all they can to ensure election integrity. Former Presidents Bill Clinton… Continue reading

Now that results are coming in for Kentucky’s primary last week, this line in a local report is worth noting: Blevins says no absentee ballots were rejected due to signatures not matching those on file. But he says quite a… Continue reading

There’s a new empirical paper out from a strong group of authors on what turnout effects Virginia’s voter ID law might have had. In this abstract, I highlight the surprising findings: One contentious question in contemporary election administration is the… Continue reading

At the Washington Post, I’ve published this op-ed urging policymakers and election administrators to recognize the critical role in-person voting must continue to play this fall. Here’s the opening of the piece: As the long lines in recent primary elections… Continue reading

I have posted this short new essay on SSRN titled The Constitutional Emergency Powers of Federal Courts. Here’s the abstract: Discussions about whether governments in constitutional democracies possess emergency powers during exigent times focus exclusively on the political branches.  But… Continue reading

As Rick notes, a cert. petition has been filed asking the Supreme Court to hold unconstitutional Texas’ law that permits all those — and only those — 65 and older to vote absentee for any reason. That petition implicates in… Continue reading

For those of us interested in how American government functions under conditions of extreme polarization, there is a passage worth noting inside the speech Sen. Hawley gave on the Senate floor yesterday (the speech is a lament on behalf of… Continue reading

This Friday, June 12th, I’ll be participating on this panel on COVID-19 and the 2020 Elections at the National Federalist Society Convention. The Federalist Society does a good job of ensuring ideological diversity on these panels. The entire conference is… Continue reading

On Tuesday, Yale Law School is putting on this conference on the internet and the First Amendment. Nate Persily and I are participating in sessions on election issues and online platforms. For access to the Zoom conference, for which you… Continue reading