On March 24, the Connecticut House Government Administration & Elections Committee passed HB 5434. This is the National Popular Vote bill. The vote was 9-8.
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The Maine Supreme Court will hear arguments over the initiative that passed last year, setting up Ranked-Choice Voting. Opponents of RCV argue that the initiative violates the State Constitution. This web page of the Maine state court system has links to all the briefs. The Attorney General and the Secretary of State argue that the State Constitution must be changed before RCV can be implemented. The legislature would be free to put proposed amendments to the Constitution on the November 2017 ballot, if it wished to.
The case is OJ-17-1, In the Matter of Request for Opinion of the Justices. It is always possible the court will hear oral arguments and then decide that it doesn’t have jurisdiction to decide anything just now.
On March 23, staff attorneys for the Federal Election Commission presented a 25-page analysis of whether the FEC should require the Commission on Presidential Debate to revise its 15% poll requirement for invitations into the general election debates. The analysis recommends against any change. It concludes, “the Commission concludes that the petition does not present credible evidence that a 15% threshold is so unobtainable by independent or third-party candidates that it is per se subjective or intended to exclude them.”
It also says, “While the reports by Dr. Young and Mr. Schoen, in addition to the historical polling and campaign finance data presented with the petition, demonstrate certain challenges that independent candidates may face when seeking the presidency, these submissions do not demonstrate either that the threshold is so high that only Democratic and Republican nominees could reasonably achieve it, or that the threshold is intended to result in the selection of those nominees to participate in the debates.”
Because this is the only draft prepared by the FEC staff, it is likely that the Commission will adopt this draft. Generally when the FEC Commissioners are divided on an issue, they ask the staff to prepare several drafts that come to different and varying conclusions.
The draft says nothing whatsoever about the political behavior or public statements of the commissioners of the CPD.
On March 23, Cheri Honkala, the Green Party nominee for the March 21 special election for Pennsylvania House, 197th district, said she will sue Philadelphia election officials and others for many instances of voter intimidation and mishandling of ballots. See this story. The Republican nominee has also asked that the ballots be sealed, but she has apparently not yet said that she will sue. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.
On June 28, 2016, some Bernie Sanders voters and delegates sued the Democratic Party in federal court, alleging that the party conspired to injure the chances of Sanders as he sought the Democratic presidential nomination. The party is attempting to get the case dismissed on jurisdictional grounds. The last brief was filed on October 14, 2016, but no action on the case has occurred since then.
The case is Wilding v Democratic National Committee services, s.d. Florida, 0:16cv-61511. The Judge is William D. Zloch, a Reagan appointee.