“The Instant Runoff Voting Patchwork: Handling Voter Errors and Ballot Length”

alternative voting systems

Tait Helgaas has written this student comment in the U. Pa. L. Rev. Here is the abstract:

As states and cities across the United States adopt instant runoff voting (IRV) in their constitutions and charters, they enact statutes and ordinances to implement this electoral system. IRV laws vary across jurisdictions, including by how many candidates they allow voters to rank and how they handle voters’ ballot-marking errors. These variations affect both the fraction of ballots disqualified due to voter error and whether an election’s winner is deemed to have earned a majority of votes. To maximize the number of ballots in the final round of tabulation and increase the odds of a majoritarian outcome, jurisdictions should consider adopting the IRV implementation rules proposed here: (1) allow voters to rank all candidates and (2) interpret overvotes, skipped rankings, and overrankings in the manner outlined within.

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Justice Riggs in 4th Circuit Cites Justice Scalia in Bush v. Gore to Support Her Request for Stay of “Cure” Order in North Carolina Supreme Court Election Dispute

Bush v. Gore reflections

From the 4th Circuit motion:

Proceeding with the proposed cure process also poses a serious risk of irreparable harm directly to Justice Riggs by undermining the legitimacy of her election victory. The U.S. Supreme Court issued a stay in Bush v. Gore, forestalling various state-court remedies pending federal court review of the equal protection issues, because proceeding with a state process “of questionable legality” threatens irreparable harm to a candidate, as well as to the public, “by casting a cloud upon what [she] claims to be the legitimacy of [her] election.” 531 U.S. 1046, 1047 (2000) (mem.) (Scalia, J., concurring)….

Consistent with the Supreme Court’s issuance of a stay in Bush, federal courts across the country allow candidates for office to assert per se irreparable harm based on constitutional violations resulting from improper election challenges. See, e.g., Moore v. Circosta, 494 F. Supp. 3d 289, 321 (M.D.N.C. 2020); Jones v. United States Postal Serv., 488 F. Supp. 3d 103, 109, 139–40 (S.D.N.Y. 2020); Gallagher, 477 F. Supp. 3d at 26, 41–42. One can barely imagine the chaos that would ensue if an arbitrary, non-uniform, and constitutionally improper state-law “cure” process suggested a change to the election outcome, only for this Court later to decide that Justice Riggs’ constitutional arguments were meritorious and the “cure” process should never have proceeded. The proverbial toothpaste can never be put back in the tube, and that is exactly why the U.S. Supreme Court intervened in Bush v. Gore….

The challenged North Carolina voters were eligible to vote in November 2024, they followed every rule, and they acted in reliance on longstanding, unchallenged election laws. “Surely, upholding constitutional rights serves the public interest,” Newsom ex rel. Newsom v. Albemarle Cnty. Sch. Bd., 354 F.3d 249, 261 (4th Cir. 2003), especially when, as here, the threatened constitutional violation would erode the “fundamental” right to vote, Raleigh Wake Citizens Ass’n v. Wake Cnty. Bd. of Elections, 827 F.3d 333, 337 (4th Cir. 2016) (quoting Bush, 531 U.S. at 104–05). “Count first, and rule upon legality afterwards, is not a recipe for producing election results that have the public acceptance democratic stability requires.” Bush, 531 U.S. at 1047 (Scalia, J., concurring).

I had fleshed out such an argument earlier this week in my Slate piece.

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North Carolina: “Elections Officials Narrow Jefferson Griffin’s Path to Victory”

Uncategorized

The Assembly:

Days after Republicans on the state Supreme Court created a path for Jefferson Griffin to overturn his 2024 loss to incumbent Democrat Allison Riggs, the Democratic-controlled State Board of Elections significantly narrowed it.  …

On April 15, the elections board provided its answer. In a filing in federal court, the board said the state Supreme Court’s decision left up in the air only 1,675 votes—1,409 overseas and military votes from Guilford County, as well as the ballots of up to 266 “never residents.” That’s far fewer than the 5,509 military and overseas ballots Griffin asked to disqualify. 

Griffin, a Republican judge on the Court of Appeals, trails Riggs by 734 votes out of more than 5.5 million cast in the state Supreme Court race. 

Griffin attempted to challenge overseas votes from four Democratic-leaning counties. But he only completed the protest for Guilford County ahead of the state’s deadline. Later, Griffin tried to supplement that protest with challenges to overseas voters in Durham, Forsyth, and Buncombe counties, complaining that officials in those counties didn’t provide him with the names of voters to target in time.

This week, the elections board said the additional protests came too late to count. The board’s determination complicates Griffin’s math. 

If all 1,675 ballots are discarded, Griffin would win if those voters backed Riggs by a 72-28 margin. That’s a steep climb, though perhaps not unthinkable. Riggs won Guilford County 62-38. She also likely won a large majority of “never residents.” According to data provided by political scientists Michael Bitzer of Catawba College and Chris Cooper of Western Carolina University, “never resident” voters are overwhelmingly young and registered as Democrats or unaffiliated.

However, not all of them will be disqualified. As The Assembly reported on Sunday, some of the “never residents” have previously lived and voted in North Carolina. The elections board told the federal court they “should be removed from the list of affected voters.” The board said it plans to give other alleged “never residents” 30 days to submit an affidavit “stating that they have resided in the county and identifying their prior residence address.” If they do, their votes will count, the board said. 

Overseas and military voters will also have 30 days to submit a photo ID or an exception form. They’ll be able to submit their documents through the online portal that most of them used to vote. The elections board told the court that voters won’t be mailed notices telling them to provide IDs—meaning the 30-day clock won’t start—until the portal is reconfigured to accept them. That process shouldn’t take long, the board said. 

In the meantime, the Riggs campaign and the state Democratic Party will likely mount a full-court press to validate as many votes as possible. The more they lock down, the narrower Griffin’s path becomes. 

The elections board might not have the last word, of course. Griffin immediately asked the Court of Appeals to intervene. He argued that overseas and military voters from six Democratic-leaning counties—Guilford, Forsyth, Durham, and Buncombe, as well as New Hanover and Cumberland, whose county elections boards never provided the voter names he asked for—must provide IDs or have their ballots discarded. He also argued that at least 516 “never residents,” not just the 266 he initially challenged, should have their votes purged by the Court of Appeals’ ruling, and said the elections board’s proposed cure process for these votes defied the court’s order.

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“State Department eliminates key office tasked with fighting foreign disinformation”

cheap speech, chicanery

Politico:

Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Wednesday announced the closure of the agency’s hub for fighting foreign disinformation campaigns — the final nail in a yearslong effort to shut down the office accused by GOP lawmakers of censoring conservative voices.

In a statement, Rubio claimed the Counter Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference office at the State Department, formerly known as the Global Engagement Center, had “spent millions of dollars to actively silence and censor the voices of Americans they were supposed to be serving.” According to Rubio, the relatively modest federal office expended “more than $50 million per year.”

“This is antithetical to the very principals [sic] we should be upholding and inconceivable it was taking place in America,” Rubio said. “That ends today. Under the administration of President Trump, we will always work to protect the rights of the American people, and this is an important step in continuing to fulfill that commitment.”…

A current State Department official, granted anonymity out of fear of retribution, said Wednesday that “the Kremlin and Chinese Communist Party are cheering today.”

“Our adversaries spread disinformation, deliberately meant to deceive and divide communities and nations and to attack the foundations of democratic societies,” the former official said. “Yet another fissure has been created in our national security that makes America even more vulnerable.”

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“Elon Musk focuses donations on GOP lawmakers targeting judges”

authoritarian threats in US, campaign finance

WaPo:

Elon Musk targeted a flurry of money in late March to support Republican members of Congress who endorsed legislation to impeach judges or restrict their power, new filings revealed, bolstering his own push to punish judges who rule against the Trump administration.

The spending, which totaled $144,400 in support of nearly two dozen members of Congress, was disclosed Tuesday in filings to the Federal Election Commission.While the amount is a fraction of the millions he shelled out for Republican candidates before the November election, the spending so early in the 2026 midterm cycle further cements the billionaire’s long-term involvement in GOP politics despite a decisive loss for his preferred candidate in this month’s Wisconsin Supreme Court race.

The reports, filed by principal campaign committees of the members, reflect only a partial picture of Musk’s political spending in the first three months of 2025. Other contribution outlets controlled by Musk, including his America PAC, are not required to file until the end of July.

Musk gave close to the legal per-race maximum of $6,600 to 21 House members, all of whom had sponsored or co-sponsored resolutions to impeach judges or restrict their power. A GOP-led Congress is not expected to vote on impeaching any judges because the issue lacks overwhelming support, but several impeachment resolutions have been filed. For weeks, Musk has used X — the social media platform he owns — to target judges who ruled against the Trump administration…

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Justice Riggs (and Others) Go to Fourth Circuit in an Emergency Effort to Stay the Federal District Court Ruling Allowing Steps Toward What is Likely an Unconstitutional Attempt to Redo State Judicial Election

judicial elections
Riggs’ case is assigned number 25-1397 in the Fourth Circuit. There are three other requests for stays from other parties that will likely be consolidated. I wrote at Slate about the disaster of the district court’s order: In a preliminary … Continue reading

“Trump IRS Pick Was Just Enriched By Tax Schemers; New documents show Billy Long’s $130,000 personal debt was suddenly paid off by donors at firms policed by the tax agency he’d lead.”

campaign finance
The Lever: President Donald Trump’s choice for Internal Revenue Service director just had his six-figure debt paid off by campaign donors whose firms have significant, often contentious business before the tax agency he would lead, according to federal records reviewed… Continue reading