Election-Campaign Law

Florida: suit against DNC's primary schedule set for argument on Thursday

Posted on January 05, 2009
The Fulton County Daily Report reports: While the nation prepares to inaugurate a new president this month, at the federal appeals court in Atlanta a few Democrats are still arguing about the presidential primary process. On Thursday the 11th U.S....

Gambling machines more regulated than voting machines

Posted on December 27, 2008
News From Underground compares Slot machines vs. e-voting machines UPDATE: a reader informs me: The images posted by MCM on News From Underground is generalized and only partially accurate. More importantly, it's lifted directly from a 2006 Washington Post story...

Maryland: states claims $8.5 million from voting machine company

Posted on December 25, 2008
The Washington Post reports: Maryland Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler filed a claim against Premier Election Solutions to recover $8.5 million spent by the state to fix problems with the company's touch-screen voting machines. The claim against Texas-based Premier, formerly...

Its back: Bush v. Gore being cited and applied

Posted on December 23, 2008
The Supreme Court’s decision in Bush v. Gore, issued eight years ago this month, was widely understood to work like that tape recorder in “Mission: Impossible.” It was meant to produce a president and then self-destruct. ... But now, as...

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Alabama: proposed Mobile redistricting messing up one candidates plans

Posted on December 22, 2008
The Mobile Press-Register reports: A proposed redistricting plan for the Mobile City Council would knock at least one potential contender out of next years election before it even begins. The would-be candidate said he believes dirty politics are at play,...

Alabama: SOS Chapman wants to copy Florida model of overseas Internet voting

Posted on December 16, 2008
The Montgomery Advertiser reports: Military members and residents overseas need a better way to cast their ballots, the state's top elections official said. ... On Monday, Chapman and members of her task force on military and overseas voting heard a....

New York: judge-elect accused of false campaign-finance reporting (court doc linked)

Posted on December 11, 2008
New York Law Journal reports: Nora S. Anderson, 56, who is scheduled to become Manhattan surrogate on Jan. 1, pleaded not guilty Wednesday to charges that she falsely reported $250,000 pumped into her campaign as her own money when in...

Illinois: bill for special Senate election to be introduced

Posted on December 09, 2008
The Hill reports: The Illinois state House is set to reconvene Monday to consider a bill that would fill President-elect Obama’s old Senate seat by special election, according to a spokesman for Illinois state House Speaker Michael Madigan (D). ......

Scotus rejects appeal on Obama's "natural-born"-ness

Posted on December 09, 2008
The NY Times reports: Without comment, the Supreme Court on Monday declined to take up an appeal by a New Jersey man who questioned President-elect Barack Obama’s eligibility for the presidency, based on his birth to a father from Kenya...

What I've been doing lately

Posted on November 30, 2008
Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons....

Alabama: US sues Sec/State for failing to file absentee-vote reports

Posted on November 20, 2008
AP reports: The Justice Department has sued Alabama officials for allegedly violating a law that protects absentee voters overseas, including those serving in the military. The lawsuit filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Montgomery is against the state of...

FEC fines Sharpton presidential campaign $497k

Posted on November 17, 2008
Ben Smith writes on Politico: The wheels of the FEC can grind slow, but they just made their way to Al Sharpton's 2004 presidential campaign, and to fining him $497,000 for illegal contributions, according to MoneyLine. The Rev.'s spokeswoman, Rachel...

California: Alan Keyes files suit contesting Obama's "natural born" status (court doc linked)

Posted on November 16, 2008
BaileyWo writes on the Open Salon blog: Alan Keyes, 2008 American Independent Party candidate, filed a lawsuit in California Superior Court Friday challenging Barack Obama's right to serve under the Constitution that specifies that candidates for the presidency must be...

Minnesota: Franken sues for information on rejected absentee ballots

Posted on November 13, 2008
AP reports: Democrat Al Franken, locked in a tight Senate race headed to a statewide recount, sued Thursday for access to data on voters who had their absentee ballots rejected. Franken's lawsuit was filed in Ramsey County District Court, but...

Georgia: people liked early voting, so the GOP wants to shorten the time

Posted on November 12, 2008
AP reports: Republican lawmakers are considering proposals for next year's legislative session that would shorten Georgia's early voting season and make it more difficult for close elections to reach a runoff. ... "Most people think it was stretched out too...

FEC will audit McCain, but likely to bypass Obama

Posted on November 11, 2008
Politico reports: The Federal Election Commission is unlikely to conduct a potentially embarrassing audit of how Barack Obama raised and spent his presidential campaign’s record-shattering windfall, despite allegations of questionable donations and accounting that had the McCain campaign crying foul...

Alabama: Provisional ballots might make the difference in Supreme Court race

Posted on November 11, 2008
The Mobile Press-Register reports: The multimillion-dollar Alabama Supreme Court race may turn on thousands of outstanding ballots. Trailing Republican Greg Shaw by a margin of 13,207 votes — out of more than 2 million cast — Democrat Deborah Bell Paseur's...

Minnesota: recount procedures

Posted on November 09, 2008
The Minneapolis Star-Tribune reports: State law triggers an automatic recount in races decided by one-half of a percentage point or less. Starting Nov. 19, after unofficial results are certified, election auditors in nearly 100 county and city election offices will...

Alabama: suit filed over illegal 1998 investigation of absentee voters (court doc attached)

Posted on November 05, 2008
The Birmingham News reports: Some black Bessemer residents who voted by absentee ballot in the contentious 1998 Jefferson County sheriff's race filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday, claiming former Sheriff Jim Woodward and others illegally investigated them in his bid to...

Evidence? We don't need no stinkin' evidence

Posted on November 02, 2008
Politico reports: For weeks, Republican leaders have warned that widely reported problems with fake voter registrations could result in a flood of phony votes in pivotal states. But Ronald Michaelson, a veteran election administrator and member of the McCain-Palin Honest...

"How to protect your vote and spot dirty tricks"

Posted on November 02, 2008
The Obama-Biden campaign has produced videos for Colorado, Florida, Indiana, Missouri, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, and Virginia. The state videos at short and mention the polling hours and some forms of acceptable ID. There is also a national video entitled...

A collection of voting problems

Posted on November 01, 2008
ProPublica's VoteWatch culls breaking news on voting issues from around the web, focusing in particular on key swing states where problems (ranging from voter registration to machine malfunction to alleged fraud or suppression) are anticipated. -- ProPublica VoteWatch - ProPublica...

Alabama: AG seizes Evergreen voting records

Posted on November 01, 2008
The Mobile Press-Register reports: Officers with Alabama Attorney General Troy King's office have seized all city and county records pertaining to the Oct. 7 municipal runoff in Evergreen, officials said Friday. Joy Patterson, a spokeswoman for King's office, said investigators...

Election-day observers from DOJ

Posted on November 01, 2008
The Washington Post's Trail blog reports: The Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice will send 800 federal observers and justice department staff to 59 jurisdictions in 23 states on Election Day to monitor polling places and elections...

Twitter Vote Report

Posted on November 01, 2008
NPR announces: If you have any voting problems, NPR wants to hear about them. As part of Twitter Vote Report – a project born out of a collaboration of volunteer software developers, bloggers and the NPR social media desk –...

New Demos reports

Posted on October 30, 2008
Expanding Voter Registration for Low-Income Virginians: The Impact of the National Voter Registration Act Report: http://www.demos.org/pub1604.cfm Press release: http://www.demos.org/page669.cfm Provisional Ballots: Where to Watch in 2008 Report: http://www...

"Republican Voter Suppression: A Guide"

Posted on October 29, 2008
TPM Muckraker reports: There are so many Republican gambits designed to make voting more difficult -- specifically for Democrats, of course -- that it can be hard to keep track of them all. So here's a handy -- and by...

California: initiative would shift to redistricting commission

Posted on October 28, 2008
The New York Times reports: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has spent more than $2 million from his campaign coffers to support a ballot proposition that could profoundly alter the composition, and perhaps the governing style, of the California Legislature...

Alabama: DOJ sues (and settles with) City of Calera for violation of VRA (court docs attached)

Posted on October 28, 2008
The Birmingham News reports: The federal government filed a lawsuit against the city of Calera in U.S. District Court, alleging the city's new voting boundaries violate the Voting Rights Act of 1965. ... The lawsuit says Calera's new voting districts,...

"Voting 2.0"

Posted on October 28, 2008
Danielle Citron writes on Concurring Opinions: A cherished right in the United States is to vote in secrecy. But what if we don't want to exercise that right in secret? What if in this age of insecure and inaccurate e-voting...

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