Ballot Measures, Legislation & Rulemaking
Los Angeles, California: Los Angeles County supervisors approved a motion aimed at strengthening election resiliency and protecting election workers — a move with implications for those administering voting in Pasadena — as the county prepares for the June 2 Primary Election and the Nov. 3 General Election. The action, authored by Board Chair and First District Supervisor Hilda L. Solis and Third District Supervisor Lindsey P. Horvath, affirms that Los Angeles County will provide for the legal defense of County election employees, in accordance with California Government Code Section 995.8, if they face federal criminal charges arising from the good-faith performance of their official election duties within the scope of their employment. The motion responds to threats of federal interference by the Trump administration ahead of the 2026 elections, according to the county’s press release. It also establishes clear authority for the County to take timely legal action should federal interference threaten the integrity or administration of the 2026 elections. The motion also authorizes County Counsel and the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk to initiate, join, participate in or support litigation, including amicus filings, in defense of free and fair elections and in response to any federal interference or disruption affecting the June and November 2026 elections.
Colorado: House Bill 26-1113 makes a handful of changes to Colorado’s elections — there’s typically an election cleanup bill every year — including lengthening the time voters have with their mail-in ballots. It would let county clerks send out ballots up to 29 days before Election Day, a reaction to worries that the Trump administration could delay postal delivery of ballots. Polis has not signed the bill. “This bill was in process long before President Trump’s illegal executive order threatening mail-in voting — but recent events make it all the more urgent,” bill sponsor Sen. Katie Wallace said in a statement after its passage. “Colorado’s elections are safe, secure, and accurate, and we have some of the highest voter participation in the nation.
Connecticut: Gov. Ned Lamont has given his approval for absentee ballots to be made available to all eligible voters in future elections statewide. Connecticut residents voting in upcoming elections and primaries will be able to use absentee ballots. The governor says no-excuse absentee ballots make voting more accessible for people who are impaired or have mobility limitations. In a statement, Lamont expressed his belief that this major change will benefit the community as a whole. “We should be doing everything we can to encourage qualified voters to participate in elections and have their voices heard,” Lamont said. “This is a responsible step forward in that direction.” Public Act 26-42 removes restrictions that prohibited people from using absentee voting unless they had specific reasons such as active military service, absence from their town, sickness, physical disability, a religious conflict or service as an elections worker. Connecticut residents voted in favor of modifying the law as a constitutional amendment during the election on Nov. 5, 2024. Upon receiving Lamont’s signature, the change became effective immediately.
Chicago, Illinois: By a 42-8 vote, alders approved a scaled-back ordinance to protect voting rights in Chicago, in honor of the legacy of the late Rev. Jesse Jackson. The so-called “Reverend Jesse L. Jackson Sr. Fair Access to Democracy Ordinance” would effectively ban the “doxing” of government employees, in particular election workers. The ordinance would make it a crime to “publish any personally identifiable information of a government worker without the consent of the government worker, knowing that such information could be used to locate, contact, or target the government worker, if the person acts with the intent to cause death, bodily injury, stalking, harassment, or intimidation.” The measure would also strengthen requirements for landlords to provide tenants with secure mailboxes in an effort to protect mail voting in Chicago. The original ordinance also would have prohibited federal immigration agents from entering so-called “democracy zones” outside polling places, but that provision was removed from the measure that passed this week. Instead, the ordinance now creates an advisory panel tasked with recommending new policies to “promote safe, fair, and accessible participation in elections within the jurisdiction of the City of Chicago. Among other potential policies, the advisory council would be asked to look into “the potential impacts of federal law enforcement activities or other governmental actions occurring near polling places that could interfere with or intimidate voters.”
Maryland: The Maryland General Assembly passed an array of election reforms this year to try and curb election interference and increase voter access ahead of the General Election this November. Under SB0029, Maryland will become the twenty-fourth state to enact a law requiring that ballot language be written in a way that is easy to understand and is digestible for voters. Any ballot question — like a request for voters to change the Maryland Constitution — must be written in compliance with the Federal Plain Writing Act of 2010 and exclude passive voice, legal jargon and double negatives. SB0237 squashes the concept of the faithless elector in Maryland, prohibiting the state administrator of elections from accepting a presidential elector’s ballot if they vote in violation of their pledge. If an elector refuses to vote in alignment with the candidate they pledged to support, the elector automatically vacates the position and an alternate elector will step in. In Maryland, mail-in or absentee ballots are counted as long as they are postmarked on or before Election Day and received by 10 a.m., 10 days after Election Day. Maryland would not be able to supersede a decision from the Supreme Court to ban the practice for federal elections, but SB0949 would preserve extended ballot counting for state and local elections. SB0670 gives the state administrator of elections or local election director the ability to keep the peace at polling places, order the arrest of anyone who interferes with the election and protect designated challengers or watchers, individuals that have been given access to observe voting activities. SB0141 criminalizes the use of AI-generated deepfakes — highly realistic synthetic media — to distribute election misinformation. The bill allows the state administrator of elections to seek an injunction for the removal of any election misinformation from online platforms and then require the administrator to release the correct information to the public.
North Carolina: This week, Republicans filed a bill to reduce the state’s early voting period from 17 days to 10. If passed this session, the bill, Senate Bill 1084, would apply to the upcoming midterm elections in November. Legislative leaders have not yet given the bill a committee hearing, but Senate leader Phil Berger has recently expressed interest in cutting the early voting period for primary elections, which have much lower turnout. Asked on Tuesday if he’d support SB 1084, which cuts the number of early voting days for primary and general elections, Berger told reporters “we’ll see what happens.” “I hear a lot of complaints from both Republicans and Democrats about the number, particularly those that have to work the elections,” he said. “Hopefully we can get some consensus around that for the primaries. I think we need to reduce the number of days in the general as well, but obviously it’s likely to face even more opposition.” SB 1084 is sponsored by Sen. Warren Daniel of Morganton, who chairs the Senate Elections Committee. House Speaker Destin Hall has also expressed support for reducing the early voting period for primary elections.
Ohio: A 2023 state law requires Ohioans to show an unexpired photo ID to vote. Some Republican state lawmakers want it in the state Constitution, too, and they want Ohioans to decide on that this fall. Some Republican representatives and senators have introduced a joint resolution to put the issue on the November ballot. A driver’s license, passport, military ID, or state photo ID is required to cast a ballot in Ohio. But Rep. Adam Bird (R-New Richmond) said future legislatures could change that, so he and other Republicans want it in the constitution. “The constitution is obviously our governing document and it’s harder to change than state law and we want to make sure that the protections given to Ohioans around photo ID will be there for many years to come,” Bird said in an interview. The resolution to put the issue before voters in November is sponsored by Reps. Bird and Heidi Workman (R-Rootstown), and Sens. Theresa Gavarone (R-Bowling Green) and Jane Timken (R-Canton). A three-fifths vote in each chamber would be required by Aug. 5 to put the amendment before voters in November. That means 60 votes in the House and 20 in the Senate. There are 65 Republicans in the House and 24 Republican senators.
Oklahoma: A measure that would have barred Oklahomans from being registered to vote if they don’t select a party affiliation did not make it to the governor’s desk. While House Bill 3722 passed off the House floor along party lines, it was never heard in the Senate. The measure would have made selecting a party affiliation or independent designation a requirement when registering to vote. Voters who failed to make a selection would have been ineligible to vote. Because the bill failed, Oklahomans who do not select any party affiliation will continue to be designated as independents as required by existing state law. House Democrats, who opposed the plan, said over 4,000 Oklahomans have registered to vote without choosing an affiliation and this would have made future applications like these ineligible for registration. The bill would not have impacted those already registered. Oklahomans are already required to provide their birthdate, address, driver’s license number and partial Social Security number to register to vote.
South Carolina: Senators will begin debate at press time on a bill redrawing the state’s congressional districts, a day after South Carolina’s election chief told them a second set of primaries will cost between $5 million and $6 million. The Senate Judiciary Committee voted 15-7 to send to the floor a new congressional map aimed at flipping South Carolina’s lone congressional seat held by a Democrat. Sen. Chip Campsen, of Isle of Palms, was the lone Republican “no.” Judiciary Chairman Luke Rankin, R-Myrtle Beach, said he wanted to move the bill to the floor for debate by the full Senate. The vote on May 20 followed about seven hours of testimony, which included an updated price tag presented by state elections director Conway Belangia. The estimates were more than double projections Belangia gave earlier this month after House Republicans launched the push for mid-decade redistricting ahead of November midterms. Belangia said initial estimates were presented off-the-cuff. The numbers went up after the state Elections Commission had time to dig deeper into past election spending, especially related to poll worker pay. The update still doesn’t include additional costs to counties.
Weston County, Wyoming: In a split vote, the Board of Weston County Commissioners voted against a proposal to implement hand-counted elections for the 2026 primary and general elections after a lengthy discussion focused on election integrity, staffing concerns and the current instability within the county clerk’s office. Members of the Weston County Republican Party’s election integrity committee returned to the commissioners’ chambers this month seeking a final decision on their proposal to eliminate voting machines in favor of hand-counting ballots. The committee first approached the board on April 21. Committee members argued that the county had the legal authority to move away from electronic tabulators and urged commissioners to act quickly in order to recruit and train election judges before statutory deadlines. Supporters again cited cost savings, public distrust of voting machines and recent election issues in Weston County as reasons to adopt a hand-count system. The committee also submitted a May 3 letter from Wyoming Secretary of State Chuck Gray, which members said supported the county’s authority to move to hand-counted elections. Commissioners, however, expressed reservations about making such a major operational change while the county clerk’s office remains in transition after the resignation of former clerk Becky Hadlock. Commission Chairman Nathan Todd said he likely would have supported the proposal under different circumstances but worried the county was already facing too much uncertainty.
Legal Updates
U.S. Supreme Court: Weeks after further weakening the Voting Rights Act, the U.S. Supreme Court sidestepped weighing in on a legal question that could severely limit enforcement of the law’s remaining protections for minority voters. In a brief, unsigned order on Monday, the high court announced it is sending cases about Mississippi and North Dakota state legislative maps back to lower courts to be reconsidered in light of its recent ruling in Louisiana v. Callais. Monday’s move by the court effectively allows the justices to take an off-ramp from hearing what could have been the next major Supreme Court fight over the landmark 1965 law. But in the Mississippi and North Dakota redistricting cases, Republican officials have raised a novel argument — that private individuals and groups do not have a right to sue under Section 2, and only the U.S. attorney general does. Such an interpretation would lead to far fewer Section 2 lawsuits, legal experts say. The Supreme Court’s decision not to take up the question of what the legal world refers to as a “private right of action” under Section 2 drew pushback from liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. In dissents from Monday’s order, Jackson pointed out the high court’s ruling in the Callais case did not address the legal question of Section 2’s enforceability by private individuals and groups. “Thus I see no basis for vacating the lower court’s judgment,” Jackson said, criticizing the move to throw out earlier lower court rulings in both the Mississippi and North Dakota cases.
Federal Litigation: President Donald Trump exceeded his authority when he issued an executive order to restrict voters’ ability to cast ballots by mail, attorneys for Democrats and civil rights groups told a federal judge on May 14. U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols didn’t rule from the bench on the plaintiffs’ request for an order blocking officials from implementing Trump’s March 31 order, his second related to elections since winning his second term in the White House. The case is one of multiple lawsuits filed to block the order on the grounds that only states and Congress, and not the president, are given power under the Constitution to decide how elections are run. Trump’s initial executive order to revamp elections by requiring documentary proof of citizenship, issued last year, was largely halted by multiple federal judges on similar grounds. He issued his latest order only after the voting bill he backed stalled in Congress. The current legal fight comes as the country is in the midst of primary elections and election officials are preparing for the intricacies of holding the fall’s midterm elections. “I understand the time pressure here,” said Nichols, who questioned both sides but gave no clear indication of which way he’s leaning.
Alabama: A federal three-judge panel is moving quickly in Alabama’s long-running congressional redistricting case. The court has set a hearing for May 22nd in Birmingham to consider requests for preliminary injunctive relief filed by plaintiffs. Judges also ordered Alabama Elections Director Jeff Elrod to appear in person and testify about a declaration filed Friday. The case centers on legal challenges to Alabama’s congressional maps under the Voting Rights Act. The hearing could help determine what happens next with Alabama’s congressional maps ahead of future elections.
U.S. District Judge Anna Manasco denied the state’s request to revert to Alabama’s 2021 state Senate map, citing a lack of jurisdiction. Responding to an emergency motion from Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen, who sought to reverse the order after the U.S. Supreme Court significantly weakened Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act in Louisiana v. Callais, Manasco wrote that she had to “preserve the status quo” after Allen filed a separate appeal to the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. “Under these precedents, the Court has no authority to vacate or stay its injunction,” Manasco, a Trump appointee, wrote. “The secretary has appealed the permanent injunction that he now asks this court to stay, and his appeal is pending in the Eleventh Circuit. As things now stand, only the Eleventh Circuit can address the merits of the secretary’s arguments for vacatur or stay, and that court has indicated that it intends to do so—on an expedited basis.” As of early Monday afternoon, the 11th Circuit had not addressed Allen’s motion.
Arizona: In April, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Scott Blaney ruled in favor of Republican Recorder Justin Heap in the lawsuit he filed against the board of supervisors over control of different parts of the county’s elections. The order seemingly resolved many issues the recorder and supervisors have fought over for more than a year since Heap took office in January 2025. Blaney ordered the board to give Heap back control of his own information technology systems after the supervisors consolidated the recorder’s staff under its own supervision. The judge also provided some clarity on Arizona’s complicated election laws, which divide administrative duties between recorders and the supervisors. But the supervisors asked the judge to stay the ruling, arguing that making drastic changes ahead of the upcoming election season — such as splitting apart the intertwined IT system — will cause confusion for election workers and voters. Blaney didn’t buy that argument, saying the board has had plenty of time to prepare. “But the Court finds it inexplicable that the Board of Supervisors — in the nine months since Recorder Heap filed the present lawsuit — would not have considered and planned for the possibility that the Court would rule in favor of Recorder Heap,” Blaney wrote. Over the course of the case, Blaney regularly encouraged both sides to find a compromise outside of the courtroom, saying judges are loath to play referee between quarreling elected officials. He reiterated that call in his most recent order. Blaney wrote he is “encouraging the parties to immediately negotiate a reasonable, mutually acceptable resolution of this dispute. If the parties are unable to resolve the entirety of this dispute, the Court encourages the parties to at least negotiate a temporary resolution that avoids any interference with the upcoming elections.” Before Blaney’s ruling in the case, the supervisors actually voted to hand back Heap control over most of the disrupted duties and staff addressed by the judge. But the fight continued as the two sides then sparred over the specifics of how they would split up those tasks.
Arkansas: The Arkansas Supreme Court dismissed Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ appeals of rulings that forced her to move up special elections for two legislative seats, days after attorneys raised questions about a special justice appointed to hear the cases. The dismissals mark the end of a legal fight that began last September when Republican Sen. Gary Stubblefield of Branch died, leaving his seat representing a large swath of the River Valley region vacant. The one-page order noted that Chief Justice Karen Baker and Justice Shawn Womack would have reversed the lower courts’ decision and dismissed both cases for sovereign immunity. Sovereign immunity is a legal doctrine that a state cannot be sued in its own court without its permission. The Republican governor called a special election to select someone to serve out the duration of Stubblefield’s term, but set the special general election for June 2026 — after the fiscal session. When Carlton Wing resigned his seat in the House a few weeks later to become the CEO of Arkansas TV, she set the special election for his district for the same date. Circuit court judges in Pulaski County quickly ruled against the schedule set by Sanders and ordered her to hold the special elections earlier. Sanders ultimately moved the elections after the Arkansas Supreme Court declined to put the rulings on pause while she appealed them.
Secretary of state hopeful Bryan Norris is taking his challenge of a recount in the Republican runoff election to trial later this month. Norris and State Sen. Kim Hammer faced off in the March 3 primary, and then again just weeks later in the runoff. While Hammer walked away the presumptive winner, he did so by less than 1,000 votes. Norris requested multiple recounts, including one in Saline County. The recount was conducted and found no change in the vote, but Norris said he had concerns about how it was conducted and if election laws were followed. An election challenge was filed by Norris in early April and dismissed hours later after a judge said there was a filing error. On April 27, the challenge was refiled. The lawsuit pinpointed a handful of issues Norris’ campaign had with the recount, claiming that his legal representative was not allowed to monitor the recount, that ballot boxes were not properly sealed, and that there were failures in the chain of custody. According to court documents in the case, the matter is set for a bench trial on May 29, 2026, in Pulaski County.
California: A Fifth Appellate District Court ruling late May 13 denied the the City of Avenal appeal to stop the recall election of its mayor and three council members. The dispute centers on whether Kings County had the authority to conduct the recall election. The city has argued the election was not properly sanctioned, while the county has maintained it had the legal authority to proceed. Voters cast ballots in late April, but the process was halted amid ongoing litigation. At this point, both of the city’s appeals have been denied in court. Because of the legal challenges, the ballots were ordered to be sequestered and not counted. With the appellate court’s latest decision, the county’s registrar of voters can now move forward with processing the ballots and certifying the results.
Brenda Lee Brown Armstrong, 64, of Marina del Rey will plead guilty to paying homeless people on Skid Row to help get initiatives on the ballot, federal prosecutors said this week, part of an effort to crack down on what they claim is widespread voter fraud across the state. Armstrong agreed to plead guilty to one felony count of paying a person to register to vote. She faces up to five years in prison. Armstrong, who worked for 20 years gathering signatures for ballot initiatives, would give people on Skid Row $2 to $3 — or, sometimes, a cigarette or a phone cord — in exchange for their signature to help qualify a measure for the ballot, according to her plea agreement.
Colorado: Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D) commuted the sentence of former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, an election denier who was convicted and sentenced for her role in a breach of her office’s election system. Polis cut Peters’ sentence from nine years to four years and four and a half months, making her eligible to be released on parole June 1. “The crimes you were convicted of are very serious and you deserve to spend time in prison for these offenses,” Polis said in his letter granting Peters’ commutation. “However, this is an extremely unusual and lengthy sentence for a first time offender who committed nonviolent crimes.” A Mesa County jury convicted Peters on multiple felony counts, including three counts of attempting to influence a public servant. During her 2024 trial, Peters, a staunch supporter of President Donald Trump, spread conspiracy theories about voting machines, as she had previously done after the 2020 presidential election. Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold (D) said Polis’ decision will “validate and embolden the election denial movement, and leave a dark, dangerous imprint on American democracy for years to come.” Judge Matthew Barrett of the 21st Judicial District sentenced Peters to nine years in state prison in October 2024. The sentence included three and a half years for each felony count. In his commutation letter, Polis wrote that Peters’ application for clemency “demonstrates taking responsibility” for her crimes and showed a “commitment to follow the law going forward.” He did not mention remorse, a common criteria for clemency.
Florida: Up against looming deadlines ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, a coalition of civil rights and voting groups pleaded with a Florida judge May 15 to block a new congressional map that could net Republicans four extra seats in the Sunshine State. Circuit Judge Joshua Hawkes, who was appointed to the bench by Gov. Ron DeSantis, held a two-hour hearing where lawyers representing the governor and the GOP-controlled Legislature argued over whether the map adopted last month violates voter-approved anti-gerrymandering standards. Hawkes, who only spoke a handful of times, did not rule at the end of the hearing and said he would issue a written decision after he got a hearing transcript.
Georgia: A group of news organizations has filed a motion to unseal filings and subpoenas in the Department of Justice’s ongoing investigation into the 2020 election in Fulton County, Georgia. In January, the FBI seized ballots and other materials from the 2020 election from an elections hub in Fulton County. Last month, the DOJ also sought to compel the county to hand over the names, home addresses, telephone numbers and email addresses of workers and volunteers who served during that election. County officials have so far refused, calling it an effort to “target, harass, and punish the President’s perceived political opponents” in a filing to quash the subpoena. They also note that the statute of limitations for any election crimes in 2020 has run out. Fulton County’s response justifies unsealing the filings, the news organizations argued. “The grand jury witness — Fulton County — has disclosed the existence of the Subpoena, publicized the fact that it moved to quash the Subpoena, and even filed the Motion to Quash on the public docket. Thus, any grand jury secrecy has been lost, and the subsequent sealing of the Motion to Quash, the Subpoena, and the docket is not necessary or appropriate,” an attorney for the media groups wrote in a motion.
Louisiana: Two days before the primary, the Louisiana Supreme Court barred interim Orleans Parish Clerk of Court Calvin Johnson from performing any clerk duties while it considers legal challenges to a state law that merged the parish’s civil and criminal courts. Civil Clerk of Court Chelsey Napoleon will handle the election process. The dispute centers on who has the legal authority to serve as clerk of court in Orleans Parish after a state law merged the parish’s civil and criminal courts. Napoleon sued New Orleans city leaders earlier this week after the City Council passed a resolution appointing Johnson as interim clerk. She is due in court in Baton Rouge next week. The Louisiana Supreme Court’s order bars Johnson from performing clerk duties while the court considers legal challenges tied to the court merger law. The court had issued a stay in the matter earlier this week. Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill said no public official should try to displace Napoleon or recognize a competing claim to the office until the court rules. Murrill praised the state Supreme Court’s order Thursday. “There is no “interim appointee” – There is only one clerk. Chelsey Napoleon has always had full control of the office. Im glad the Supreme Court has stepped in to ensure the continuity of those continuing operations,” Murrill said. Murrill sent letters May 13 to New Orleans officials demanding they reverse course on the council’s resolution and a related special election for the clerk’s office.
Missouri: Richard von Glahn, Executive Director of People Not Politicians, sued Secretary of State Denny Hoskins and Attorney General Catherine Hanaway over Hoskins’ refusal to make a ruling on the sufficiency of a referendum campaign challenging new voting maps, and of announcements from both officials that said the new map, which could give Republicans an additional seat in Congress, was the “law of the land”. Last week the Missouri Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling that said the new maps were constitutionally compact, and also said the mere submission of People Not Politicians’ referendum campaign petitions challenging the new map was not enough to automatically put the new maps on hold pending a public vote. The process had to wait for Hoskins to decide if the referendum petitions were sufficient, the Supreme Court ruled last Tuesday. Under the law, he doesn’t have to do that until Aug. 4, the same day as the primary involving the new maps. A ruling of insufficiency would simply trigger a court appeal. Over the past week, a number of county election officials, including at least one who supports the so-called 7-1 map, have said they can’t move forward with the new map until they know for certain that it won’t be overturned. “We need the secretary of state to make a decision so the courts would give us a decision on which map is in effect,” St. Charles County Election Authority Kurt Bahr, a Republican, told The Missouri Independent. “We don’t want to have confusion as well as a potential lawsuit if we are going from one election to another election with a different map.” The lawsuit filed this week asks the court to order Hoskins to immediately rule on sufficiency, and prevent Hoskins and Hanaway from taking further steps to implement or mandate the use of the new maps until there is a final verdict on the maps’ status.
North Carolina: Wake County Superior Court Judge Jennifer Bedford has accepted a deal ending a Republican Party lawsuit against the State Board of Elections over removing noncitizens from voting rolls after they are identified through jury questionnaires. Bedford accepted the agreement after a 19-minute online hearing. Activist groups had intervened in the case. They opposed the deal between GOP groups and the state elections board.They objected to a provision that calls for election officials to post information about the noncitizen voters on the State Board of Elections website. “I do agree that consent of the parties is required, that the intervenor-defendants do not have to consent,” Bedford said after hearing from lawyers on all sides of the dispute. “I’m glad that there are groups that are paying attention. I’m glad that it seems that everyone is moving toward more transparency and the availability of information — with an eye to … protect privacy when necessary.” “Defendant State Board has and will continue to comply with its statutory obligations under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 163-82.14(cl) to perform list-maintenance efforts regarding those persons who have self-identified in response to a jury summons that they are not United States citizens (‘Self-Identified Non-Citizens’),” according to the proposed consent judgment. The agreement also spells out schedules through 2028 for the board to receive information from clerks of Superior Court across North Carolina. Within 30 days of receiving the information from court clerks, the elections board would “[r]eview the voter-registration and citizenship status of each person identified,” “[d]istribute to each county board of elections a report of the persons identified who are registered to vote in that county, including information provided under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 9-6.2, the voter registration number of the person, and the result of the NCSBE’s review of the person’s voter registration and citizenship status,” and “[f]urnish to the State Bureau of Investigation and the district attorney a copy of its investigation for prosecution if the prospective juror voted prior to becoming a U.S. citizen.”
Ohio: Maria Dearaujo, 63 was found not guilty of illegally voting in the 2018 election when she was a lawful permanent resident of the United States. A guilty verdict would have led to up to 18 months in prison for Dearaujo. But Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Chris Brown sided with the defense’s argument of entrapment. This generally entails a government actor leading a person into committing a crime they wouldn’t have otherwise committed. Brown, a Democrat, said Dearaujo’s trial testimony lines up with the documentary evidence. She admitted to “inconvenient” facts like having voted when she knew she was not a citizen. But she got the idea from and relied on the advice of a Bureau of Motor Vehicles clerk. “The defendant testified she never thought about voting or intended to vote until a BMV clerk, a government official, told her to register,” Brown said. “The court finds that Ms. Dearaujo has proven, by a preponderance of the evidence, an affirmative defense of entrapment.”
Virginia: The U.S. Supreme Court on May 15 turned down a request by Virginia’s attorney general and other Virginia Democrats to allow the state to use a new congressional map, which would have been expected to strongly favor Democrats, in the 2026 elections. The denial came in a brief, unsigned order sent to reporters at 6:30 p.m. EDT on Friday – just 15 minutes after the court’s Public Information Office distributed the reply filed by Jay Jones, the Virginia attorney general, and Democratic legislators. There were no public dissents from the order. The effects of the court’s order are likely relatively minimal, because Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger had already indicated earlier this week that the state would not use the 2026 map in the upcoming elections. Jones and the other Virginia Democrats came to the Supreme Court on May 11, asking the justices to block a May 8 ruling by the Virginia Supreme Court that invalidated an amendment to the Virginia Constitution allowing the state’s Legislature to enact a new congressional map. In their filing on Monday asking the justices to step in, Jay and the Virginia Democrats argued that the Virginia Supreme Court’s ruling “overthrows [a] democratic outcome just days before the Commonwealth must begin its preparations to administer the 2026 midterm election.” Moreover, they contended, the dispute implicates “two critical issues of federal law” – the meaning of the term “election” under federal law, and the idea that the state court so “impermissibly transgressed the ordinary bounds of judicial review” that its ruling should be reversed. In a filing on Friday afternoon, Jones and the Democrats told the justices (among other things) that “Spanberger’s candid acknowledgment of where things presently stand, which is not part of the record, does not foreclose this Court from acting.” Instead, they argued, her comments merely indicated that “the Commonwealth will conduct its elections in the manner the law requires, and this Court’s intervention will inform that conduct.” Soon after the filing was submitted on Friday, the court denied the request by Jones and the Virginia Democrats without comment.
Washington: U.S. District Court Judge Robert Lasnik has rejected a request to ditch political maps for Washington’s Legislature that he approved two years ago. Now, opponents are waiting to see if the U.S. Supreme Court will weigh in on whether the maps comply with an April ruling from the high court in the case Louisiana v. Callais, which significantly curtailed the use of race in drawing districts. Lasnik approved the redrawing of legislative district boundaries in 2024 to enhance the political voice of Latino voters in the Yakima Valley. This came in response to a lawsuit over the map the state’s bipartisan redistricting commission came up with in 2021. Lasnik on May 15 denied opponents’ motion to undo his changes and restore the commission-drawn boundaries. In a 10-page order, Lasnik said Jose Trevino and state Rep. Alex Ybarra, R-Quincy, didn’t have standing to file their motion for the revised map to be tossed out. Trevino and Ybarra, who intervened in 2022 in the dispute, argued Lasnik’s earlier ruling doesn’t comply with the Callais decision. Absent relief from the court, Washington’s elections will take place under a map that is impermissible based on the Callais ruling, they argue.
West Virginia: In a legal filing, the U.S. Department of Justice said that it has the right to access unredacted voter registration files held by the West Virginia Secretary of State’s Office. Attorneys for the Department of Justice (DOJ) filed a memorandum May 14 with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia in response to a motion filed at the end of April by attorneys for Secretary of State Kris Warner, which sought to dismiss a lawsuit filed by the DOJ seeking unredacted voter registration files. Harmeet K. Dhillon, a U.S. assistant attorney general with the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division, filed a lawsuit against the Secretary of State’s Office on Feb. 26 after Warner sent a written response to the DOJ denying its request. The federal government wants to compel the production of unredacted statewide voter registration lists to investigate compliance with federal election laws, such as the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) and the Help America Vote Act (HAVA). While attorneys for the Secretary of State’s office argue that such a demand violates state privacy laws and exceeds federal authority, the DOJ argues that Title III of the Civil Rights Act of 1960 (CRA) provides a broad mandate to inspect all election records. The government contends that this investigative tool is essential for verifying the accuracy of voter rolls and identifying potential violations.
Wisconsin: Dane County Judge Everett Mitchell has ruled that the Wisconsin Elections Commission was wrong to order Madison to remove 23 late-arriving absentee ballots from its count and has ordered the city to count them in the soon-to-be-certified Wisconsin Supreme Court race. The ruling comes in response to a lawsuit brought by two of those 23 voters, who alleged that the Wisconsin Elections Commission unconstitutionally ordered Madison not to count the ballots. The absentee ballots at issue arrived at the polls after 8 p.m., a delay city officials say was caused by election administrator error. State law requires that absentee ballots be “delivered to the polling place no later than 8 p.m.” on Election Day, but the lawsuit alleged that it would be illegal to disenfranchise properly cast votes over election officials’ errors. “Voters who comply with every element that is required for them to vote a special absentee vote, and then not being allowed to have the votes count, is contrary to what good law in Wisconsin has been,” Mitchell said from the bench according to Votebeat. The ruling came after an hour-long back-and-forth between attorneys for the Wisconsin Elections Commission and the plaintiffs over the rights of voters when election officials commit errors.
A new lawsuit from the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin argues allowing clerks to decide whether or not to offer absentee voters a chance to correct information on their mail-in ballots violates the state Constitution. The group is asking a Dane County judge to order a uniform and mandatory process for addressing defective ballots and notifying those who mail them. The suit, filed Tuesday in Dane County Circuit Court, claims giving local clerks the discretion to create their own procedures for telling voters about how to fix missing or incomplete information on absentee ballot envelopes violates state Due Process provisions. The League of Women Voters of Wisconsin argues that’s because clerks in some communities can decide not to notify voters, who then won’t know their ballots weren’t counted until after the election. “Accordingly, municipal clerks may arbitrarily determine whether and which defective ballots cast by mail-in absentee voters will ultimately be counted,” said League attorney Jon Sherman.
NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote! Michael H. Drucker
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