Legislative Updates
Alabama: Rep. Wes Allen (R-Troy), Republican candidate for Alabama Secretary of State, sponsored HB194 which bans private individuals or organization from purchasing election machines, ballots or supplies and prohibits those same entities from paying election administration officials or their staffs. That bill passed both the Alabama House and Senate and, yesterday, Governor Ivey signed it, making it the law in Alabama.
Colorado: The House State, Civic, Military, & Veterans Affairs Committee considered the bi-partisan Internal Election Security Measures bill, which would explicitly prohibit unauthorized images to be taken of voting equipment and to make leaking passwords a felony. Under the proposal, individuals convicted of sedition, insurrection, treason, or conspiracy to overthrow the government would be automatically banned from overseeing elections in Colorado. With clear allusions to Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, Secretary of State Jena Griswold testified in support of the bill. “Since the 2020 Election, our office has responded to previously unheard-of efforts to undermine the security of our elections. We have seen election officials here in Colorado and in other states compromise voting equipment and breach election security rules in the attempt to prove unfounded conspiracy theories,” Griswold said in a statement. “These actors, some of whom are elected to office and trusted by the public to uphold the security of our elections, have done the exact opposite — their behavior has tarnished public confidence in our elections and fueled false narratives about how elections function,” Griswold added.
Indiana: The Hamilton County Commission has passed an ordinance limiting the number of campaign signs candidates can post. The measure, effective immediately, limits the signs to two per candidate at early voting sites and one at precincts on election day. “It looks like a carnival at the polling sites,“ Commissioner Christine Altman said in a prepared statement. “Some candidates are placing four, five or more signs at a single location. Multiple that by the number of candidates, and the problem is clear.” The ordinance also restricts the size of the signs to 2-by-3 feet, and they cannot be placed with metal or wood posts, but rather with wire stakes. Commissioner Steve Dillinger said commissioners considered whether the ordinance was unfair to challengers before they voted and decided it was not. “We are not trying to confine anybody,” said Dillinger, who has served on the commission for 32 years and is not up for re-election this cycle. ”We felt that if everyone went by the same rules that it would not be unfair. This is to prevent people from overdoing it.”
Massachusetts: In a unanimous vote, the Medford City Council opted to realign the city’s voting procedures, taking the responsibility for elections out of the City Clerk’s office and its staff to create an appointed Election Commission and election coordinator. The change will simplify the voting process, creating a different department to oversee the process, everything from the vetting of signatures on nomination papers to the collecting and counting of ballots. “This will separate elections from the office of the City Clerk,” said Council Vice President Isaac B. “Zac” Bears. “It creates a new department, with a new director.” The change is made in accordance with the state’s general laws governing elections: communities can opt for an appointed Board of Registrars under the auspices of the City Clerk and staff, or it can create a commission.
Minnesota: A major elections bill (SF 3469) would mandate that counties allow observers — appointed by political parties and candidates — to watch ballot boards, which examine absentee ballot envelopes to determine if ballots should be accepted or rejected. These ballot board observers would watch the opening of ballot envelopes, acceptance or rejection of ballot envelopes, depositing of absentee ballots into ballot boxes and counting of ballots. The observers would be allowed within four feet of the ballots or envelopes, and would be allowed to question or challenge head election officials. The ballot boards’ work would be livestreamed on Election Day and the week before, when absentee ballots are processed, and viewable on the Minnesota Information Technology Services website. The bill would also require livestreaming of absentee ballot drop boxes. The bill would also prohibit the release of any precinct election results until all results from that precinct have been counted, including absentee ballots processed by 8 p.m. on Election Day. Secretary of State Steve Simon said in a letter to lawmakers that the bill could create additional burdens for election administrators and poses a risk to voter privacy. “I understand the motivation in many provisions in the bill is increased transparency, but rigorous security measures are already built into our system, and we should work to bring the public further into the voting process using these existing procedures,” he wrote.
Mississippi: Gov. Tate Reeves has signed legislation into law that requires the secretary of state’s office to confirm that a new voter-registration applicant is an American citizen by cross-referencing two databases: the Mississippi Department of Public Safety’s driver’s license and identification system and the federal Systematic Alien Verification For Entitlements database, also known as SAVE. The Mississippi secretary of state already cross-references the state database, but not the federal one. Under the law, if both the state DPS and SAVE databases flag a voter as a noncitizen, the person will have 30 days to submit proof of citizenship to their local county clerk. If a person fails to submit proof and attempts to vote, they can cast an affidavit ballot, but must provide proof of citizenship within five days afterward for the vote to count. H.B. 1510 also repeals a 1924 law requiring naturalized citizens to prove their citizenship upon registering to vote by presenting their certificate of naturalization. A 2019 lawsuit challenged that law, saying it made voting harder for naturalized immigrants than other American citizens.
Montana: The Legislature will not hold a special session next month to set up a committee on election security, after the required number of legislators failed to approve the proposal. Montana Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen’s Office released the results of a poll, asking all 149 sitting legislators whether they supported holding a special session on May 2. A total of 44 lawmakers, all Republicans, supported the call. 60, including 22 Republicans and 38 Democrats, voted against it. The remaining 45 lawmakers did not return their ballots by the deadline. 75 votes – a majority of legislators – were needed to call a special session. n March, ten Republican lawmakers sent a letter to Jacobsen, calling for the poll. They wanted to propose a “Select Special Interim Joint House and Senate Committee of Election Security,” to investigate the state’s election procedures. In their letter, they pointed to “the continuing and widespread belief, among a significant majority of Montana voters, that sufficient irregularities in election security in Montana create serious doubt as to the integrity of elections in our State.” The lawmakers said the committee should have subpoena powers and come with funding for legal staff and frequent meetings.
Nebraska: Lawmakers gave final approval to a bill that makes a number of changes to Nebraska’s election laws. LB843, introduced by Sen. Tom Brewer of Gordon, makes several minor changes to current law. Among other provisions, the bill: prohibits electioneering within 200 feet of a ballot drop box; establishes a deadline of 8 p.m. Central time or 7 p.m. Mountain time on Election Day for receipt of mail-in ballots; allows voters who cannot sign their name to use either a symbol or a signature stamp; allows county election commissioners to appoint certain election officials who live outside of the county if that county conducts elections exclusively by mail; requires non-governmental organizations distributing voter registration forms or early ballot application forms to use those prescribed by the Nebraska secretary of state; expands the definition of voting system to include software or service used in the process of creating, casting and counting ballots; allows an election commissioner or county clerk to remove a voter from the voter registry if they receive information from the state Department of Motor Vehicles that the voter has moved out of state; and establishes procedures for removing a voter from a county’s early ballot request list. Senators passed LB843 on a 45-0 vote.
South Carolina: State senators are fast tracking two election reform bills ahead of the 2022 elections. In a Senate Judiciary Committee meeting Senators discussed changes to the way South Carolina conducts its elections. The measure, passed unanimously by the House last month, includes an ID for requirement for those voting with absentee ballots, a guaranteed number of voting sites in every precinct, and two weeks of in-person, no excuse early voting. Under the bill, people would not need a reason to vote early in person, as they do now. It also implements processes for State employees to audit election results and create new enforcement procedures for potential voter fraud. As the bill is written now, voters 65 and up would be allowed to vote absentee. Isaac Cramer of the Charleston County Board of Elections urged senators to act quickly before the June Primaries. “When it comes to early voting, and it comes to the opening of the absentee ballots, we would ask that you would pass this bill because the time is of the essence,” said Cramer. “Every day that passes that this bill does not go to the governor’s desk is another day where we need to get that to get that information out to the public.”
Virginia: City Councilwoman Katherine Jordan (2nd District), has introduced legislation would install ranked-choice voting as the method for ensuring the winner in each of the nine districts secures a majority when there are multiple candidates running for a seat. Currently, the winner is the candidate with the most votes, even if that total is less than 50 percent. As proposed, if no one wins more than 50 percent of the votes after the ballots are tabulated, the “instant runoff system” the General Assembly authorized in 2020 would kick in. Limited for use only in city council and boards of supervisors’ elections, the system would drop the bottom vote-getter, with that person’s votes distributed to the remaining candidates based on the second-choice preferences of his or her supporters. Jordan is pushing to make Richmond the first locality in the state to adopt this method. Arlington and Fredericksburg also are considering adopting rank-choice voting. Jordan said that Richmond Voter Registrar Keith G. Balmer has expressed confidence that his office could successfully implement ranked-choice voting and educate voters about it before they go to the polls.
Legal Updates
Colorado: A Colorado judge will decide whether to block embattled Mesa County Clerk and Recorder Tina Peters from overseeing this year’s elections, after she refused sign an order directing her to abide by the secretary of state’s conditions aimed at protecting the county’s voting equipment and voting systems. The court heard testimony this week from former Secretary of State Wayne Williams and Deputy Secretary of State Chris Beall. A second hearing is scheduled for Thursday. Beall described the state’s motive for pursuing litigation against Peters, stemming in part from statements she made on podcasts, in press conferences and at public forums about her role in leaking voting machine images in 2021. “My view, and the secretary’s view, was an unrepenting admission of the unlawful action and gratitude that the action had occurred,” Beall told the court. Beall maintained the county’s elections were securely and accurately carried out in 2020 and 2021, even though conspiracy theorists cast doubts. The court did not indicate when or how it will decide the case, but election deadlines are fast approaching.
North Carolina: A new filing from legislative leaders asks the state Supreme Court to steer clear of a case involving ex-felon voting rights. A Superior Court panel ruled 2-1 in March in favor of the felons. The NC Court of Appeals issued an April 5 order temporarily blocking the ruling. Now the felons and their advocates are asking the state’s highest court to take the case out of the Appeals Court’s hands. “For the second time in this litigation, the Superior Court has sought to drastically change North Carolina’s election rules on the eve of an election,” according to a brief filed from Nicole Moss, an attorney representing state legislative leaders. “The court permanently enjoined Defendants to allow all convicted felons serving sentences outside of prison to register and vote. That injunction is irreconcilable with the North Carolina Constitution, which disenfranchises all convicted felons until ‘restored to the rights of citizenship in the manner prescribed by law.’” The March 28 decision threw out a 1973 state law setting rules for felons to regain voting rights. The law blocked voting for any felon who had not completed his full sentence. There’s no deadline for the Supreme Court to decide whether to take the case.
Ohio: The Ohio Supreme Court again rejected new legislative maps, sending the Ohio Redistricting Commission back to the drawing board for the fourth time. In another 4-3 decision, the court ordered the Republican-controlled commission to file new district maps for the state Senate and House of Representatives by May 6. The majority found that the latest set of statehouse maps, like the three previous iterations, violates the Ohio Constitution and its voter-approved amendment concerning redistricting and gerrymandering. State election officials have said they need new maps to be finished by April 20, in order to have them ready for Aug. 2, the last possible day for a makeup legislative primary to be held. State legislative candidates have been pulled from the ballot for the regularly scheduled May 3 primary, which features a U.S. Senate race. But the majority dismissed that concern in its unsigned opinion. “The so-called April 2 ‘deadline’ for implementing a General Assembly-district plan appears to be an artificial deadline that is based on a speculative, potential primary-election date for stat legislative races,” the ruling states. The opinion added, “No matter what the primary date is to be, time is of the essence.”
Texas: A coalition of civil rights groups filed a federal lawsuit against Galveston County, alleging that the county’s redistricting plan intentionally discriminates against a growing minority population in the Gulf Coast community. The complaint marks the second lawsuit that seeks to overturn maps approved by the Republican majority on the county’s governing body. Last month, the Justice Department filed a federal lawsuit against the county on similar grounds — in a redistricting dispute that has garnered national attention. The new lawsuit — brought by the Texas Civil Rights Project and the Southern Coalition for Social Justice on behalf of local branches of the NAACP and the Galveston League of United Latin American Citizens Council 151 — alleges that the new map diminishes the voting power of Black and Hispanic voters by splitting up the only majority-minority precinct. The lawsuit alleges the Republicans majority pushed through a “racially discriminatory map” that “largely took place behind closed doors.” Sarah Chen, an attorney with the Texas Civil Rights Project, called the map — and the process used by the Republican majority in the county to approve it — “egregious examples of people in power … exercising that power to dilute the votes of racial minorities.”
NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote! Michael H. Drucker
No comments:
Post a Comment