The Erie County, New York election board has finished tallying the write-in votes for the November 2, 2021 election for Mayor of Buffalo. They show that the incumbent mayor, Byron Brown, won his election as a write-in candidate. See this story. Thanks to Steve Kamp for the link.
On November 19, U.S. District Court Judge Kathryn Vratil, a Bush Sr. appointee, enjoined a new Kansas law that makes it illegal for groups outside to Kansas to send absentee ballot applications to Kansas voters. Kansas allows anyone to vote early, but the voter must apply for a postal ballot. The plaintiffs include two groups that try to encourage voter turnout. VoteAmerica v Schwab, 2:21cv-2253.
The constitutionality of the new law is not yet settled, but the order means that while the case is underway, the law will not be in effect. Here is the 46-page order.
On November 19, the Eleventh Circuit issued an opinion in Libertarian Party of Alabama v Merrill, 20-13356. It upholds Alabama’s discriminatory policy for access to the list of registered voters. The 28-page opinion will not be published. The decision is by Judge Robert Luck, a Trump appointee. It is also signed by Judge Jill Pryor, an Obama appointee; and Judge Andrew Brasher, a Trump appointee.
Alabama gives a free list of the registered voters to the qualified parties, and to state legislators, and to the state administrative office of courts, and election officials of other states. But it charges unqualified parties $35,913 for the list.
In 1970 a 3-judge U.S. District Court in New York ruled that if the state gives a list of the registered voters free to qualified parties, it must also give it to parties that are petitioning to get on the ballot. The U.S. Supreme Court summarily affirmed this decision, 400 U.S. 806. The new Eleventh Circuit decision says this precedent doesn’t control this case, because in New York the list was given to parties that, while not qualified, “had succeeded in gaining a position on the ballot.” In the New York case, the plaintiffs Socialist Workers Party, and Socialist Labor Party, sued in early 1970 to help them with their 1970 petition. It is true that they had appeared on the New York ballot in 1968 and previous years, but that does not differentiate that case from the Alabama case. The Libertarian Party has also gained a position on the Alabama in the past, which the decision admits.
The decision says if the state had to give the Libertarian Party the list, an employee of the Secretary of State “would have to export the list from a program called PowerProfile; import the data into Microsoft Access; export the data from Access to a text file; and then email the list to the party requesting it. This process takes about fifty minutes and, because of the demands of processing this very large file, prevents the employee’s computer from doing other tasks.”
The decision does not mention any of the other five precedents from other courts that ruled that if the state gives a free list of the registered voters to the qualified parties, it must give the list free to groups that are petitioning.
The decision admits on page three that, “the voter list is an important tool for effectively locating voters, petitioning for ballot access, and campaigning for elected office.” The decision does not mention that the Libertarian Party is currently petitioning for 2022 in Alabama. However, that fact is not in the record, because this case was filed before the party decided to launch its statewide 2022 petition.
On November 17, the Sixth Circuit upheld Michigan’s law for term limits for state legislators. Kowall v Benson, 21-1129. Here is the decision.
The decision is not a surprise. No federal court has ever invalidated a state legislative term limits law, and many states have them. Thanks to Thomas Jones for this news.
The Bangor Daily News has this article about the November 17 decision in the Maine Libertarian Party ballot access lawsuit. The reporter who wrote the story put her main emphasis on the part of the decision that struck down the law that converts all minor party members to independents when that minor party goes off the ballot. The reporter put less attention on the other part of the decision, which strikes down the number of signatures needed for a minor party member to get on that party’s primary ballot.
UPDATE: here is the Courthouse News Service story on the decision.
