“The House’s Republican bias is gone. But the gerrymander lives.”

March 3, 2025, 5:50 amUncategorizedNicholas Stephanopoulos

Eric McGhee, Chris Warshaw, and I wrote this column in today’s Washington Post on the evaporation of the U.S. House’s longstanding pro-Republican bias in the 2020s. For more than two decades, the House was consistently biased in Republicans’ favor. Votes… Continue reading

Elena Kagan Says Her Most Meaningful Dissenting Opinion is Her Dissent in Common Cause v. Rucho

March 3, 2025, 4:30 amUncategorizedRichard Pildes

Justice Kagan, who went to Princeton, recently received Princeton’s Wilson Award, the university’s highest honor. In one of the best interviews I’ve seen of a current Justice, Princeton President Chris Eisgruber interviewed Justice Kagan. Toward the end, around 42.00, he… Continue reading

42 Former North Carolina County Election Directors with 750 Years of Combined Experience Urge Appellate Court Not to Throw Out Election Results in State Supreme Court Race by Changing the Rules After the Fact

March 1, 2025, 5:33 pmchicanery, judicial electionsRick Hasen

This is quite a statement in this brief: In their private lives, Amici are not united politically—some are registered Republicans, some registered Democrats, and some Unaffiliated. In the 2024 North Carolina Supreme Court election, some voted for Judge Jefferson Griffin,… Continue reading

DOJ Gets Another Extension to Respond to Cert Petition in NRSC Campaign Finance Case–Making It More Likely We Don’t See a Decision for Another Year Plus If SCOTUS Takes Case

March 1, 2025, 5:11 pmcampaign finance, political partiesRick Hasen

The latest extension goes through April 9. My earlier coverage is here and here.

“Donald Trump Still Hasn’t Disclosed His Secret Transition Funders”

March 1, 2025, 4:51 pmconflict of interest lawsRick Hasen

Notus: Donald Trump still hasn’t disclosed private transition donors, missing a deadline that every other president, including Trump himself in 2016, has met for decades. When Trump’s campaign decided to run a fully privately funded presidential transition, it also jumped… Continue reading

“Democrats Fume Over a Data Disaster Averted: ‘This Can’t Happen Again'”

March 1, 2025, 5:13 amcampaignsRick Hasen

NYT: Problems with a huge database of voter information that effectively functions as the central nervous system of the Democratic Party grew so worrisome last summer that top Democrats staged an extraordinary intervention to keep it running through the… Continue reading

“Musk and Republican Lawmakers Pressure Judges with Impeachment Threats”

March 1, 2025, 4:22 amauthoritarian threats in USRick Hasen

NYT: Congressional Republicans, egged on by Elon Musk and other top allies of President Trump, are escalating calls to remove federal judges who stand in the way of administration efforts to overhaul the government. The outcry is threatening yet another… Continue reading

“Catalysts of Insurrection: How White Racial Antipathy Influenced Beliefs of Voter Fraud and Support for the January 6th Insurrection”

March 1, 2025, 4:19 amfraudulent fraud squadRick Hasen

Tye Rush, Chelsea Jones, Michael Herndon, and Matt Barreto have written this article for the Journal of Race, Ethnicity and Politics. Here is the abstract: On January 6, 2021, the belief that voter fraud was to blame for Trump’s 2020… Continue reading

“Democratic National Committee Files Lawsuit Against Trump; The party claims President Trump’s executive order aimed at independent agencies will gut the Federal Election Commission.”

March 1, 2025, 4:16 amfederal election commissionRick Hasen

NYT: The Democratic Party sued President Trump on Friday, contending that his assertion of control over independent executive-branch agencies, which include the bipartisan Federal Election Commission, violated federal election law. The lawsuit, which was jointly filed by the three… Continue reading

Wisconsin: “Bice: Was it sexist for Brad Schimel to say liberal justices, all women, were ‘driven by their emotions’?”

March 1, 2025, 4:13 amjudicial electionsRick Hasen

Dan Bice in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel: Let’s stipulate at the outset that conservative Waukesha County Judge Brad Schimel never mentioned the gender of the four justices who control the Supreme Court. Let’s also agree that this is what Schimel said on Nov.… Continue reading

“The SAVE Act Would Force Many Rural Americans To Drive Hours To Register To Vote”

February 28, 2025, 9:03 amUncategorizedRick Hasen

CAP: Soon, the U.S. House of Representatives will vote on the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act—legislation that would require Americans to provide documentary proof of citizenship, in person, when they register to vote and every time that… Continue reading

“How Elon Musk Executed His Takeover of the Federal Bureaucracy”

February 28, 2025, 7:29 amchicaneryRick Hasen

NYT: On the last Friday of September 2023, Elon Musk dropped in about an hour late to a dinner party at the Silicon Valley mansion of the technology investor Chamath Palihapitiya. Mr. Musk’s visit was meant to be discreet.… Continue reading

“The case of the missing $3M: Eric Adams’ campaign finance woes grow”

February 27, 2025, 9:04 pmcampaign finance, chicaneryRick Hasen

Politico:A mysterious $3 million sitting in Mayor Eric Adams’ reelection account is the latest irregularity giving campaign finance officials cause to deny him crucial public matching funds. The Campaign Finance Board broadened the criteria it used to deny Adams… Continue reading

How German Elections Are Financed

February 27, 2025, 7:21 amUncategorizedRichard Pildes

I’m often asked, including by students, about how elections in other major democracies are financed. Since Germany just had elections, there was some explanation of this issue in the press. A good summary can be found in this article;… Continue reading