Ballot Measures, Legislation & Rulemaking
Denver, Colorado: Denver City Council on August 11 rejected a proposal to bring ranked choice voting to Colorado’s largest city, but moved forward with another change to the city elections. The effort to bring ranked choice voting to Denver failed in a 6-7 vote. The proposal would have converted all races in Denver to a ranked choice model, with voters ranking up to six candidates for elected positions like mayor, council member and city clerk. If the council had approved the measure, it would have gone before Denver voters this November. Denver voters have shown some interest in ranked choice voting — it was one of the few counties where a majority of voters approved Prop. 131, an earlier statewide proposal for ranked choice voting. But with the council’s action on Monday, the measure will not appear on the ballot this November.
Ohio: A pair of Democratic state lawmakers want to give voters the chance to sign up for absentee ballots permanently. Eight states allow all their citizens to opt in to regular absentee voting, and another 11 allow specific populations like people with disabilities to do so, too. But under current law in Ohio, voters must file a new absentee ballot request with every single election. Ohio House Bill 400 would create several avenues for voters to sign up for the permanent absentee ballot list. The measure directs the Ohio Secretary of State to develop a new form for voters to add their name; voter registration, change of address and change of name forms would all get a new box allowing voter to opt in as well. Ditto the online voter registration portal. Finally, anytime a voter requests an absentee ballot for an individual election, they could also sign up for absentee ballots going forward. The proposal doesn’t direct county boards to send the actual ballot. Instead, voters would get the ballot request form. To get an actual ballot the voter has to return that form with identifying information including date of birth, social security number or driver’s license and their signature. “Folks who regularly vote by mail can voluntarily opt into being part of a system where they’re always going to get an application to vote by mail,” Rader explained. “So they don’t have to go seek that out every election. They don’t have to go find a form, or go online and request a form and remember to do that, put it on their calendar. So, it just kind of removes a step,” he added, “makes it a little bit easier for folks that prefer to vote by mail.”
U.S. Virgin Islands: Senators failed to advance two election reform bills that would have reshaped how political parties nominate candidates and clarified the balance of power between the Board of Elections and the Supervisor of Elections, leaving long-debated conflicts and outdated laws in place for another election cycle. Bills to clarify election laws, address quorum contradictions and grant the Board of Elections final authority over the Supervisor of Elections remained in committee after they did not receive the necessary second motions by members of the Senate Committee on Government Operations, Veterans Affairs and Consumer Protection to move them forward during a hearing on August 8. Both measures, sponsored by Sen. Alma Francis Heyliger, proposed amendments to Title 18 of the Virgin Islands Code. Bill 36-0071 would have set a process for political parties to choose nominees for public office. Bill 36-0073 would have defined the powers of the Supervisor of Elections and the Board. At the hearing, Board of Elections Chairman Raymond Williams and Supervisor of Elections Caroline Fawkes urged lawmakers to modernize Title 18, which governs the territory’s election laws and has not been updated in more than 30 years. Bill 36-0073 would have codified that the Supervisor and Deputy Supervisor of Elections could appeal their removal to Superior Court, reaffirmed that there is a singular Board of Elections and given the Board explicit authority to overrule decisions of the Supervisor. After further discussion, both bills died in committee from lack of support.
Wisconsin: Gov. Tony Evers recently vetoed a bill, AB87/SB95, that would have suspended the right to vote for Wisconsinites convicted of a felony who have served their sentence until they fulfill outstanding court-order obligations, such as fines, costs, restitution or community service. In Wisconsin, people who have served their criminal sentence for a felony, including incarceration and community service, parole, probation and extended supervision, are eligible to vote. But the proposed legislation would have required any outstanding requirements – “fines, costs, fees, surcharges, and restitution [and] any court-ordered community service, imposed in connection with the crime” – to be addressed in full before voting rights were fully restored. In vetoing the proposed legislation, Evers said, “This bill would create additional barriers to make it harder for individuals who have completed their sentences to have their right to vote restored. My promise to Wisconsinites has always been that I will not sign legislation that makes it harder for eligible Wisconsinites to cast their ballot. I will continue to keep that promise.”
Legal Updates
Florida: U.S. District Judge Mark Walker has struck down part of Florida’s controversial 2023 elections law, ruling that a provision barring noncitizens from handling voter registration applications is unconstitutional, but leaving intact most of the law’s other restrictions on third-party voter registration organizations. In a 55-page order, Walker found that the citizenship requirement in SB 7050, which GOP lawmakers pushed to passage in April 2023, violates the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause because it is “facially discriminatory with respect to alienage.” The decision blocks Florida from enforcing the provision against Humberto Orjuela Prieto, a Colombian-born permanent resident who works as a canvasser, and his employer, Latino civil rights and advocacy nonprofit UnidosUS, one of several plaintiffs in the case. But the injunction is narrowly tailored. Walker said, referencing the U.S. Supreme Court’s Trump v. CASA, Inc. decision in June, that he could not issue a statewide injunction, limiting relief to Orjuela Prieto and UnidosUS. The ruling still effectively blocks the state from penalizing those parties or their employees under the provision.
Georgia: A panel of the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals heard arguments this week over whether civic organizations have a right to hand out food and water at polling places. Civil rights attorneys asked the three-judge panel to uphold a lower court’s ruling that relief activities, including handing out food and water, were a form of speech protected by the First Amendment. A state attorney argued the conduct was too vague to constitute a form of expression and authorities had an overwhelming interest in maintaining order at polling places. The panel also heard arguments on whether the state can require absentee voters to print their date of birth on the outer envelope of an absentee ballot. The Election Integrity Act of 2021, signed into law by Republican Governor Brian Kemp after the 2020 elections, enacted new voting restrictions that spanned from voter ID requirements to polling conduct. Multiple civil rights groups sued to block the law, claiming Georgia’s voting restrictions make it much harder for all Georgians to vote, particularly people of color, new citizens, and religious communities. U.S. District Judge J.P. Boulee, a Donald Trump appointee, issued preliminary injunctions in 2023 blocking the law’s provisions related to line-relief activities and birthdates on absentee ballot envelopes. Citing Holloman v. Harland, Boulee found a reasonable person would interpret line-relief activities as expressive conduct protected by the First Amendment. Georgia Solicitor General Stephen J. Petrany argued at Wednesday’s hearing that a reasonable person would not assume that providing water bottles to voters was an activity fraught with deeper meaning. Expressive conduct requires symbolism, he argued, such as a raised fist or rude hand gesture. Even if line-relief activities qualified as expressive conduct, Georgia had the authority to limit speech near a polling place to protect the integrity of the voting process. “Georgia can decide that we don’t want voting to be a raucous event,” Petrany said.
Louisiana: The Supreme Court this week released the calendars for the October and November argument sessions. The October session will feature 10 arguments over five days, while the November session will feature nine over five days. Both sessions include important cases. On Oct. 15, the court will hear oral arguments in a Louisiana case that could limit the federal Voting Rights Act. When the court hears argument in Louisiana v. Callais, it will be the second round of arguments in the case, which comes to the court as a challenge to the congressional map that the Louisiana Legislature adopted in 2024. That map, which contained a second majority-Black district, followed a federal court’s ruling that a 2022 map, which contained only one majority-Black district, violated Section 2 of the federal Voting Rights Act, which prohibits election practices that result “in the denial or abridgement of the right of any citizen to vote on account of race, color, or membership in a language minority group.” A group of voters describing themselves as “non-African American” went to federal court, where they argued that the 2024 map was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander – that is, it relied too heavily on race.
Michigan: A Saginaw County attorney is accusing Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) of disenfranchising voters in Michigan’s 35th state Senate district, arguing in a lawsuit that her refusal to call a special election for a long-vacant seat “undermines public trust … and erodes the legitimacy of enacted laws.” “In a democratic republic, the absence of representation is not a mere inconvenience — it is a denial of one of the most fundamental political rights,” attorney Philip Ellison, with Outside Legal Counsel, wrote in a suit filed Monday in the Michigan Court of Claims on behalf of seven local residents. According to Votebeat, the complaint asks a judge to order Whitmer to call a special election within seven days. The governor’s office did not respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit. The seat in the 35th Senate District has been vacant for the last seven months after Democrat Kristen McDonald Rivet was elected to the U.S. House and officially left the Michigan Senate on Jan. 3.
Muhtasin Sadman and Mohammed Hassan, two Hamtramck city council members, are facing felony charges that they forged signatures on absentee ballots in the city’s 2023 council race, according to new court filings, although it’s unclear how many ballots may have been manipulated. According to an April document that Attorney General Dana Nessel used to request a special prosecutor in the case, Sadman and Hassan, along with four others, “conspired to receive unvoted absentee ballots that had been signed by recently naturalized citizens, and to then fill in the candidates of their choosing” in the city’s 2023 election, the records say. They allegedly paid for votes “in order to gain an advantage in local elections,” the document said, and two other council members were also being investigated. Those council members, Abu Musa and Mohammed Alsomiri, have not been charged, according to court records.
Mississippi: The Republican National Committee (RNC) is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to reject Mississippi’s request to review a federal appeals court decision that struck down the state’s post–Election Day grace period. In a brief filed August 11, the RNC argued the justices should not review the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ ruling, which held that Mississippi’s five-day grace period for counting mail ballots postmarked by Election Day violates federal law. “The Fifth Circuit correctly held that the federal election day is the day by which ballots must be both cast by voters and received by state officials,” the RNC wrote. “A post-election receipt deadline for mail ballots extends ‘the election’ beyond the ‘day’ set by Congress.” Mississippi law previously allowed mail-in ballots to be counted if they arrive within five business days after the election, so long as they are postmarked on or before Election Day. Grace periods like this are often a safeguard for voters who rely on the mail service to vote — especially military, overseas and rural voters — ensuring that ballots mailed on time aren’t thrown out simply because of postal delays. The RNC, the Mississippi Republican Party and individual voters sued in 2024, claiming that extending the receipt deadline “dilutes the weight of timely, valid ballots” of voters who comply with the deadline.
North Carolina: Digital IDs cannot be used to vote in North Carolina until the legislature explicitly allows it, under a settlement between the state Board of Elections and the Republican National Committee. The RNC and the state GOP sued the state Board last year after it voted along party lines to allow UNC-Chapel Hill students to use their mobile UNC One cards as photo ID. University student and facility IDs, if the state Board approves them, are among the acceptable forms of photo identification voters can use at the polls. Many campuses have replaced physical cards with multipurpose digital IDs. UNC’s was the first digital university ID the state Board approved. A trial court last year sided with the state Board, but the state Appeals Court blocked use of the mobile IDs. Students weren’t allowed to use them for the 2024 election. As part of the agreement dismissing the lawsuit, the state Board agreed to not approve any more digital IDs unless the legislature passes a law allowing them. Democrats held a 3-2 majority on the elections board last year. Republicans now have a majority.
Texas: More than a dozen men and women who were charged in connection with a vote-harvesting scandal appeared in court on August 13. All 15 suspects appeared either in-person at the Frio County Courthouse or virtually for the Wednesday morning hearing. Six of the 15 suspects, who were indicted in May, entered not guilty pleas earlier this year. The other nine, who were indicted in June, officially pled not guilty in court this week. Because other judges in the county excused themselves from the case, it was presided by state Judge Sid Harle of the 4th Administrative Judicial Region via Zoom. The 4th Administrative Judicial Region spans 22 counties, including Frio.
NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote! Michael H. Drucker
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