Grimmer, Hersh, Meredith, Mummolo, and Nall have posted “Comment on ‘Voter Identification Laws and the Suppression of Minority Votes.’” Here is the abstract: To study how voter identification laws affect participation in elections, Hajnal, Lajevardi and Nielson (2017) examines validated … Continue reading
Category Archives: The Voting Wars
Opposition. … Continue reading
Pam Fessler for NPR: Hans von Spakovsky of the Heritage Foundation says he’s neither been asked to participate in the investigation or been consulted about it. “Which seems a bit odd given that I’m one of the leading experts on … Continue reading
Brief: All of the petitioners in this case have moved to withdraw the pending petition. Thus, under normal operation of this Court’s rules, the petition should be dismissed. See S. Ct. R. 46.2(a). Seeking to derail this ministerial process, the … Continue reading
AP: The Republican-controlled House has approved a contested voter identification bill along party lines after forcing debate to end. … Continue reading
Listen at NPR. … Continue reading
Laurel Rosenhall for CalMatters: With President Donald Trump alleging serious voter fraud in California, and the state’s top election official calling his claim untrue, how much voter fraud is actually under investigation in the Golden State? Not much—certainly not enough to … Continue reading
Release: Attorneys for Hispanic Federation, Voto Latino, Chhaya CDC, MinKwon Center for Community Action, and New York resident William Towbin sent a pre-litigation notice letter today, alleging that the state is failing to meet its obligations under the National Voter … Continue reading
Daniel J. Hopkins, Marc Merdith, Michael Morse, Sarah Smith, and Jesse Yoder have written this article for the Journal of Empirical Legal Studies. Here is the abstract: One contentious question in contemporary election administration is the impact of voter identification requirements. We … Continue reading
NPR: This isn’t the first time Trump has blasted out such uncorroborated claims on Twitter, in national interviews and elsewhere — and gone on to ask for an investigation into them. It’s not even the first of his 6 1/2-week … Continue reading
WaPo editorial. … Continue reading
Miles Rapoport for TAP: Two issues, however, were too fraught with partisan conflict to achieve any consensus on the part of the assembled secretaries of state: Russian hacking and calculated interference in the election, and the president’s claim of massive … Continue reading
Release: Today, the Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless and the Columbus Coalition for the Homeless, joined by the Ohio Democratic Party, filed a petition for certiorari asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear their challenge against Ohio voter-suppression laws known as … Continue reading
KCCI reports. … Continue reading
Concord Monitor: If crowds of Massachusetts residents came into New Hampshire on Election Day as part of widespread voter fraud – a claim made by President Donald Trump’s administration and others – they managed to do so without creating any … Continue reading
Read at Slate. … Continue reading
The dispute between the Governor/AG and Legislature as to who speaks for North Carolina and whether its cert. petition can be withdrawn has gotten the Supreme Court’s attention. There is now a docket notation that the consideration of the case’s … Continue reading
In the NYLJ. … Continue reading
Michael Slater for Project Vote: Secretary Husted very likely exaggerates the number of non-citizen registrants and voters. He misleads his constituents about the availability of a reliable and accurate federal database of non-citizens. He fails to explain that the few … Continue reading
Ariane de Vogue for CNN. … Continue reading
With a nice section on voting rights, in the new NYT Magazine. … Continue reading
Manny Fernandez and Eric Licthblau in the NYT: The Justice Department remains a party in the case. But it is pulling back at a crucial phase. If a judge finds the state acted with discriminatory intent, as the Justice Department … Continue reading
Sari Horwitz for WaPo: The practical effect of the Justice Department’s decision is that civil rights groups will continue, without the backing of the federal government, to contest the purpose of the Texas law. “DOJ’s reversal in position defies rationality … Continue reading
Well, we’ve been expecting this. Here’s a motion to be filed at the Supreme Court objecting to NC AG’s motion to dismiss the cert. petition in the controversial NC voting case. And here’s a motion to add the Legislature and … Continue reading
Before tomorrow’s hearing, the United States Department of Justice will ask a federal district court to voluntarily dismiss its claim that in enacting its strict voter identification law, Texas acted with a racially discriminatory purpose. There is nothing in the … Continue reading
Via Josh Gerstein comes news of this latest ruling in League of Women Voters v. Newby, concerning a directive from EAC director Newby allowing states (including SOS Kobach’s Kansas) to require documentary proof of citizenship before using the federal form … Continue reading
In the oral argument in today’s Wisconsin [corrected] case, around the 29 minute mark, Judge Easterbrook asks plaintiffs’ counsel: “A large part your brief reads as if the argument is: ‘When Democrats are in control they are free to expand … Continue reading
Release: Recent reports confirm that Vice President Mike Pence will lead a task force to investigate President Trump’s unproven voter fraud claims and is gathering names of individuals who will be part of it. The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational … Continue reading
Hope to see Austin folks at this ACS event (with cookies!). I’ll be giving a faculty workshop that day too, presenting Race or Party, Party as Race, or Party All the Time: Three Uneasy Approaches to Conjoined Polarization in Redistricting and … Continue reading
Patrick Marley for the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel: Three federal judges expressed deep skepticism Friday over claims that Wisconsin Republicans had deliberately made it harder for minorities to vote, raising the prospect they would reinstate limits on early voting. Judge Frank Easterbrook … Continue reading
A federal district court, following a remand from the Fifth Circuit, is considering whether Texas acted with racially discriminatory intent when it passed its controversial voter identification law. The district court had already made a finding that Texas had such … Continue reading
The Daily Banter reports. … Continue reading
WMUR reports. … Continue reading
Release: Groups and individuals suing Texas over its strict photo ID law filed a brief in U.S. District Court today in opposition to a joint request by the state and the United States Department of Justice, who asked to delay … Continue reading
See this filing. So it looks like the Court is very likely to dismiss the case, unless the NC Legislature gets involved and can convince the Court that it can assert the interests of the state of North Carolina. So … Continue reading
The Hill: “He’s announcing that Vice President Mike Pence will lead a task force on this,” Spicer said when asked about Trump’s accusations that 3 million to 5 million people voted illegally in 2016. The White House so far has … Continue reading
AP: The U.S. Justice Department joined Texas’ attorney general Wednesday in asking a federal court to delay a hearing on the state’s voter ID law, the latest signal that the federal government might drop its opposition to the law now … Continue reading
Note: An earlier version of this post said that there was a party line vote at the North Carolina Board of Elections not to withdraw from the case. That’s correct, but it was not the end of the story. I … Continue reading
Douglas Hess oped for the Des Moines Register: Iowans should take pride in knowing that our state, like many Midwestern states, has a reputation for relatively even-handed public administration. Unfortunately, some officials are bruising that reputation with proposals to add … Continue reading
You can find the documents here. As I noted yesterday, there is a dispute over whether the North Carolina governor can end this litigation while the legislature wants it to continue. There is also the question, as noted in the … Continue reading
Court order: Considering VIP-NC’s allegation that the number of registered voters in Wake County has exceeded, and continues to exceed, the number of eligible voters, which allegation is in turn supported by reliable data and WBOE’s failure to use available … Continue reading
Important Molly McGrath LA Times oped: States that have implemented voter ID laws have shown little to no interest in helping their citizens comply. And the advocacy organizations that oppose these laws have few resources for direct voter assistance. Instead, groups … Continue reading
Last week I explained the following: North Carolina has filed its reply brief in the North Carolina voting case, and the Supreme Court is set to review it at its March 3 conference. (If the Court does grant review, it typically … Continue reading
Chris Seaman has written this oped for the Roanoke Times. … Continue reading
WRAL: During a discussion of voter fraud during this week’s episode of WRAL News’ “On the Record,” Francis De Luca of the conservative Civitas Institute cited a statistic to highlight the potential that some number of people in North Carolina … Continue reading
Miles Rapoport blogs at the Ash Center’s Challenges to Democracy blog. … Continue reading
Lawrence Journal-World: Sheriff McGovern, a Republican who was re-elected in 2016, said he and his mother had no intention of wrongdoing when she registered to vote at an address that she no longer lived at. When asked why he thought … Continue reading
Very useful piece from the Virginia Pilot. … Continue reading
AP: The Texas law requires voters to show one of seven approved forms of identification to cast ballots. It was softened in August to allow people without a driver’s license or other photo ID to sign an affidavit declaring that … Continue reading