Brent Kendall and Alexa Course for the WSJ:

Intense court battles over voting rights and election security always promised to be part of the 2020 election cycle, but the coronavirus has added new urgency to the cases, which are multiplying nationwide.

This month’s fight over when and how Wisconsin voters would cast their ballots marked the unofficial start of the litigation campaign. In the two weeks since, courts in several other states have issued notable decisions about conducting elections during a pandemic, and a host of new lawsuits has been filed.

“Before I’d ever heard of the coronavirus, I was convinced that this was going to be a record year for litigation,” said University of California, Irvine law professor Richard Hasen. “Now I’m even surer of that fact.”

Voting-rights fights have been growing for years, a function of tighter voting regulations in several Republican-led states, intense partisanship and a realization that electoral rules can affect outcomes in close races. The cases have nearly tripled since 2000, the year of the Bush v. Gore showdown, Mr. Hasen said. According to his new book “Election Meltdown,” the 2018 election year saw a record 394 cases, surprisingly high for a nonpresidential cycle.

Throw into the 2020 mix the divisions over President Trump and the importance of state legislative races whose winners will control redistricting after the 2020 census, and experts see a recipe for an even more furious litigation season.