Rocky De La Fuente’s federal lawsuit against the new California law on presidential candidate tax returns and primary ballot access has been transferred from the federal court in San Diego (the southern district) to the federal court in Sacramento (the eastern district). Therefore, all the five federal cases against the new law are assigned to U.S. District Court Judge Morrison England. The hearing is September 19. The case number for De La Fuente v Padilla is now 2:19cv-1659.

The state has asked permisison to file a single brief that will relate to all five cases. The state also wants permission to exceed the normal length for briefs of this type. It is difficult to imagine a single brief, because the cases differ in some ways. They include two candidates, President Donald Trump and De La Fuente, who are not situated identically. Also they include two cases that have no candidate-plaintiffs, just voter-plaintiffs. And they include a case filed by the Republican National Committee, which has issues of freedom of association that are not present in the other cases.

On August 27, the Seventh Circuit upheld a U.S. District Court injunction against a 2017 Indiana voter registration restriction. Common Cause Indiana v Lawson, 18-2491. Here is the decision.

The issue is a 2017 Indiana law that says if the state finds out that one of its registered voters is also registered in another state, then Indiana will immediately cancel the Indiana voter registration without contacting the voter. The decision says this policy violates the federal voter registration law. It also points out that although voting in two states in an election that is occurring on the same day in both states is illegal, merely being registered to vote in two states simultaneously is not illegal.

The state argues that the plaintiff Common Cause does not have standing, but the court said it does have standing.

On August 25, the California Democratic Party Executive Board endorsed Proportional Representation. The resolution says, in part, “Therefore be it resolved that the California Democratic Party supports the institution of proportional representation and multi-member districts to foster greater electoral representation, provide equity to minority discourses, and increase the diversity of our elected officials.”

Here is a link to all the resolutions adopted on August 25. The proportional representation resolution is Resolution 19-05.167. Scroll down. Thanks to Steve Chessin for this news.