On January 27, Texas Governor Rick Perry asked to withdraw from the lawsuit Perry v Judd, 12-1067, the case in the 4th circuit over Virginia’s ban on out-of-state circulators. However, Newt Gingrich, who had intervened in the lawsuit last month, will keep the case alive.

The U.S. District Court in this case had ruled that the out-of-state circulator ban is almost certainly unconstitutional, but that Perry and the other intervening presidential candidates had filed the lawsuit too late to get injunctive relief. Perry had appealed the denial of injunctive relief, but the 4th circuit had agreed that he had filed the case too late. The 4th circuit has not yet expressed an opinion about the constitutionality of the state ban on out-of-state circulators, but will probably do so fairly soon. Briefs on that issue are all due by March 30, 2012. In the meantime, it seems likely that the legislature will repeal the ban on petitioners who live in Virginia but who circulate outside their home district, but will retain the ban on out-of-state circulators.