On January 28, Texas filed this brief in Bilyeu v Esparza, w.d., 1:21cv-1089. This is the Libertarian Party challenge to the law that requires candidates seeing a nomination at a convention to have already paid a filing fee.
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On January 31, fourteen states filed an amicus curiae brief in the U.S. Supreme Court in Merrill v Milligan, the Alabama U.S. House redistricting lawsuit. Louisiana officials wrote the brief, which was then also signed by Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, and West Virginia. All those states have Attorneys General who are Republicans. The brief is on the side of Alabama.
The main point of the amicus is that it is too late to redraw the Alabama districts. The brief admits that the lawsuit against the Alabama districts was filed on November 4, 2021, the very day the new Alabama districts were finalized. The brief complains about the difficulty for Alabama to redraw its districts given that the primary is May 24. But the brief does not acknowledge that Alabama could postpone its 2022 primary. In 2020 many states postponed primaries. Alabama congressional primaries were in June from 1986 through 2010. In 1980 they were in September.
On January 31, Congressman Madison Cawthorn filed a federal lawsuit against the North Carolina State Board of Elections. Cawthorn v Circosta, e.d., 5:22cv-50. The lawsuit seeks to stop the State Board from determining whether or not he is eligible for Congress. A challenge is pending against him based on the Fourteenth Amemdment, section 3, which says that members of Congress who had taken an oath to support the Constitution, and who then engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the Constitution, are ineligible to remain in Congress.
Here is the brief, which argues that only Congress can judge the qualifications of its members. Thanks to Political Wire for the news.
On January 31, Silver Spring Township officials agreed to swear in Kevin Gaughen as an elected Township Auditor, after having first refused to do so, even though he was elected on November 2, 2021, and no one disputed that he met the qualifications. The election is partisan and Gaughen is a Libertarian.
The township refused to swear him in because it believed that it didn’t need any elected township auditors, because it had hired an accounting firm. But that decision was incorrect, as this Reason story shows. The Reason story ran before the officials decided to accept Gaughen. The Reason story generated enough local publicity to persuade the township to reverse its earlier stance.
A few days ago, the Maine Secretary of State letter like this one to 5,830 voters who were enrolled Libertarians in late 2018 but who are not now enrolled Libertarians. The letter asks the recipient if he or she wishes to re-join the Libertarian Party. There is a postage-paid postcard inside the letter, to let the recipient re-enroll.
The Secretary of State will announce the results at the end of March.