On September 14, U.S. District Court Judge Maxine Chesney moved the hearing in Peace & Freedom Party v Weber from October 2 to October 23.
4
On September 17, the New Mexico Secretary of State filed this brief in the U.S. Supreme Court in New Mexico Forward Party v Toulouse Oliver, 26A357.
On September 16, U.S. District Court Judge Mary Geiger Lewis ordered both sides in South Carolina Republican Party v Bolchoz, 3:26cv-2699 to go through the mediation process. This is the lawsuit in which the South Carolina Republican Party is seeking a closed primary for itself. South Carolina has always had open primaries.
The mediation will start October 6 and must be finished by June 1, 2027. If the mediation process doesn’t succeed, a trial will begin on July 16, 2027.
On September 16, defenders of the South Dakota initiative process filed this brief in Dakotans for Health v Johnson, 25-2940. This is the lawsuit over the petition deadline. The Eighth Circuit had struck down the February deadline on August 11, 2026. Now the state is trying to get all the judges of the Eighth Circuit to overrule that decision.
The Eighth Circuit will hear Onder v State of Missouri, 26-2827, on Thursday, September 17. The plaintiffs are a Republican member of congress and a Republican nominee in Missouri. They still argue that the U.S. Constitution does not allow referenda or initiatives to apply to election laws for Congress. They are still trying to persuade a court to use the 2025 district maps instead of the 2022 maps.