On August 22, the Michigan Republican Party filed a federal lawsuit against the new Michigan redistricting commission. Michigan Republican Party v Benson, w.d., 1:19cv-669. The case is assigned to U.S. District Court Judge Janet T. Neff, a Bush Jr. appointee.

The complaint says the party does not oppose the idea of a redistricting commission, but it objects to the Michigan commission because it calls for four Republican members, four Democratic members, and five members who are neither. The Republican Party says that commission members self-identify with their party. Michigan does not have registration by party. The lawsuit argues that if the Republican Party is going to be represented by four commissioners, then the party should have input into who those four Republicans will be. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.

On August 21, the Libertarian Party asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear its appeal against the federal campaign finance law that won’t let a deceased person’s estate distribute its bequest to the party, except by doling out the money in small pieces each year. Libertarian National Committee v Federal Election Commission, 19-234. Here is the cert petition. The U.S. Court of Appeals, D.C., Circuit, had upheld the federal rule.

On August 23, U.S. District Court Judge Matthew Kennelly dismissed the lawsuit Gonzales v Madigan, n.d., 1:16cv-7915. It had been filed in 2016 by one of Michael Madigan’s opponents in the Democratic primary. Madigan is a member of the Illinois House of Representatives. He has been speaker for 33 years and is also chair of the Illinois Democratic Party. His district has been tending toward being a majority-Hispanic district. In the 2016 primary, Madigan appears to have recruited two candidates with Latino names to run against him, to divide the Hispanic vote, and defeat Jason Gonzales. Madigan won the primary.

In 1973, the Seventh Circuit had ruled in Smith v Cherry that when a sham candidate is recruited, that is a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Gonzales depended on that precedent, and filed a federal lawsuit against Madigan. But after three years of complicated proceedings in the Gonzales case, the judge dismissed it on the grounds that during the 2016 primary campaign, the charge that two of the candidates were sham candidates had been widely publicized. Here is the 19-page decision.