Author Archives: ELECTIONLAWCENTER.COM

Arizona Will Appeal Voter Registration Ruling to U.S. Supreme Court


Courthouse News Service reports:


“The court upheld the requirement that persons wishing to vote must show identification at the polling place,” [AZ Attorney General Tom] Horne’s office said in an email. “The part we will have to appeal is dealing with registration. We always expected the U.S. Supreme Court to have to decide this one. The people of Arizona have a right to request that people registering to vote show some evidence they are citizens and we fully expect the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold that.”

CT Senate Approves Constitutional Amendment to Expand Absentee Balloting

The Hartford Courant reports:


 


The state Senate voted Wednesday for a rare Constitutional amendment that would make it much easier to vote by absentee ballot – requiring no reason or excuse at all.  The measure, if passed by the voters in November 2014, would remove all restrictions on obtaining absentee ballots, which are currently granted under certain circumstances such as being away at college or being disabled.


 


But Republicans complained that the measure would open up a wide variety of issues, including Saturday voting, online voting, and early in-person voting that would allow citizens to cast ballots, for example, over the period of a week or more. They said they were concerned about potential voter fraud.

DOJ Fails to Bring Any Section 2 Cases: How to Do Damage Control

 From my testimony before the House Judiciary Committee yesterday, what happens when you campaign against the Bush administration’s voting rights record, then do almost nothing once in office?  You employ puffery.  My testimony to the House Judiciary Committee and video stream here:


    “In response to criticism for failing to enforce Section 2, the Department of Justice has recently adopted a curious new public position – that it is conducting a record number of Section 2 investigations.   Assistant Attorney General Perez recently told the National Secretaries of State that the DOJ has opened “almost 100” Section 2 investigations.  This is a public relations strategy without substance. 



    “Here is what is actually happening.  Soon after I and others criticized the DOJ for a lack of Section enforcement, the Voting Section launched the “almost 100” Section 2 investigations.  The demographer at the Voting Section identified scores of American jurisdictions – counties and towns – with substantial minority populations based primarily on census data.  No voters have complained from these newfound targets.  Names from this target list have been parceled out to various Voting Section attorneys to take a preliminary glance to see if the matter might be worth pursuing.  These inquiries almost never go beyond looking at the current make-up of the legislative body, and may not even involve an analysis under Gingles One.   That is, the “investigation” doesn’t even reach the preliminary point of whether it is even possible to draw a minority-majority district.  In an effort to puff the “investigative” numbers, these sweeping glances are assigned a “DJ” number, and thus become “investigations” for public relations purposes. 


    “Had the Bush administration used such flimsy standards for characterizing an inquiry a “Section 2 investigation,” they probably could have boasted of hundreds of Section 2 investigations.  Indeed, I personally conducted at least 100 such preliminary inquiries, except that in many instances I actually drew maps for Gingles One purposes.  The reality is that the “almost 100” Section 2 investigations currently being “conducted” by the Justice Department constitute little more than a public relations exercise designed to keep critics quiet about the absence of Section 2 enforcement.”



New York Redistricting Updates

On Wednesday, a panel of three federal judges rejected a motion to dismiss its supervision of New York redistricting. The same judges appointed a special master to draw the state’s congressional districts…after state officials on the legislative task force called LATFOR reached a stalemate.


 


State Court of Appeals hearing on state Senate lines scheduled for April 26, DOJ ruling on VRA compliance expected by April 27.


 


Updates here and here.

Another Insightful Piece from a Civil Rights Veteran

Arnold Trebach at the American Spectator: “Such shameful racial pandering gets votes, lots of them. There is an important election coming in November. As a veteran of the original civil rights movement, I simply cannot believe that this is happening to the country that I love. . . .

IN THE RECENT PAST the mobs were white and the objects of their hate were black, as at many efforts to integrate schools in compliance with court orders. National and local police and military forces were ordered out to hold the white mobs back. Now one of the main inciters of violence is Al Sharpton, our president’s designated leader of outreach to the black community. Moreover, there seems to be no attempt to curb the Black Panthers, who a few years ago were also given favorable treatment by Mr. Holder’s Justice Department. I repeat: this is a nightmare for all of us, including the millions of decent black citizens who will take years to recover from this trauma.”