U.S. District Court Expedites Georgia Lawsuit Over Whether Voters Can Register for U.S. House Run-off in June

Georgia law does not permit anyone to register to vote, and then be eligible to vote, for a run-off, after the deadline for registering in the first election. Only voters who were already registered for the first election may vote in a run-off, even though the two events are approximately two months apart in time. The Georgia NAACP challenged this law in a lawsuit filed April 20. On April 24, U.S. District Court Judge Timothy Batten expedited the case, which is Georgia State Conference of the NAACP v Kemp, n.d., 1:17cv-1397.

The state must respond to the lawsuit by April 28, Friday, at noon. Oral argument will be Thursday, May 4, at 2 pm.

Link to French Government Election Returns Page

See here for the official election returns from the web page for France’s elections administration. Although there are very few returns posted, it is possible to click on the map to see the returns from various overseas possessions of France and see how they voted.

The Guardian’s web page here is better for people who want to see the entire national vote totals. Thanks to Eric Garris for the links.

Independent Party of Florida Regains Qualified Status

On April 20, the Florida Secretary of State acknowledged that the Independent Party is again a qualified party. On February 20, 2017, the Secretary of State had revoked the party’s status because of tiny technical flaws in its financial reports.

The party re-filed. It now has the same status that it did last year, except that because the party ceased to be recognized for a few months, the state changed the voter registration records of all the party’s members so that it doesn’t now have any members, except for a few individuals who re-registered into the party on April 20-21. Thanks to Ernie Bach for this news.

Hearing Set in Lawsuit filed by Bernie Sanders Supporters Against Democratic National Committee

U.S. District Judge William Zloch will hold oral arguments in Wilding v Democratic National Committee Services, s.d. Florida, 0:16cv-61511, on Tuesday, April 25, at 1:30 p.m. in Fort Lauderdale. This is the case filed on June 28, 2016, by some supporters of Bernie Sanders. They complain that the Democratic national committee broke its own neutrality rules during the 2016 contest for the Democratic presidential nomination. The party is trying to persuade the judge that the plaintiffs lack standing.