On January 16, the 3-judge U.S. District Court that had upheld California’s new U.S. House district boundaries refused to suspend its own order. Now the California Republicans who filed the case will ask for U.S. Supreme Court review.
Reply
On January 14, the Virginia House passed HJR 4, a proposed constitutional amendment that would suspend the non-partisan redistricting process for U.S. House districts, and allow the legislature to draft new districts mid-decade, if another state has already done the same thing. On January 16, the Senate passed it also, so it is now law. But it won’t take effect unless the voters approve the idea. The date of the special election for voters to decide would probably be April 21.
The bill passed on party-line votes, with Democrats in favor and Republicans opposed.
The three pending lawsuits over the existence of the Arizona Independent Party have been consolidated. The case number for all three cases is cv2025-064149. The reason there were originally three lawsuits is that three entities had sued the Secretary of State for letting No Labels Party change its name to Arizona Independent Party. The three were the Clean Elections Commission, the Arizona Democratic Party, and the national and Arizona Republican Parties.
It is very unusual for a lawsuit involving a minor party to have the Secretary of State on the side of the minor party, with the other side consisting of both major parties. This appears to be a unique event in U.S. history.
SFGate, an on-line news source centered in San Francisco, has this story about the California gubernatorial race. The story singles out ten gubernatorial candidates and implies they are the only candidates worth mentioning. The list includes eight Democrats and two Republicans.
The story does not mention Green Party member Butch Ware, the only minor party candidate who has been actively campaigning and who has ever been included in any polls and participated in any debates. Nor does the story discuss the concept that the two Republicans might end up placing first and second in the June primary, which would create a November ballot with no Democrats and no write-in space.
On January 15, California Republicans filed notice of appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court in Tangipa v Newsom, c.d., 2:25cv-10616. They also asked the 3-judge U.S. District Court to put its recent ruling (upholding the new U.S. House districts) on hold, pending the appeal. Here is the brief asking for a suspension of the ruling.