On April 26, the U.S. Supreme Court issued an opinion in Heffernan v City of Paterson, New Jersey, 14-1280. By a vote of 6-2, the Court ruled that a policeman who was demoted because he was seen holding a campaign sign for a candidate for Mayor is entitled to damages. It was already settled law that government employees cannot be demoted, fired, or denied promotion, just because of their political activities, unless they are in policy-making decisions or work closely with policy-making officials.

But in this case, the policeman had not actually been campaigning for any candidate for Mayor. He was merely delivering a campaign sign to his bedridden mother, who wanted to put the sign in her lawn. The lower courts denied any relief for the policeman, on the theory that while he may have been protected if he had been engaging in campaigning, in this case he wasn’t campaigning. The U.S. Supreme Court reversed the lower courts and said even if he wasn’t campaigning, the fact that he was demoted because he was thought to be campaigning also entitles him to relief. See this story.

On April 26, Donald Trump tweeted that Bernie Sanders has been treated badly by the Democratic Party and that Sanders ought to run as an independent. See this story.

According to this article, it is likely that the only two candidates on the November 2016 ballot in California’s 46th district will be Democrats. In the primary, there are four Republicans running, and three Democrats. It is probable that with four Republicans in the race, no Republican will manage to place first or second. The 46th district is in Orange County, California’s third-most populous county. No incumbent is running, because the incumbent, Loretta Sanchez, is running for U.S. Senate.

California has used top-two in two elections so far, 2012 and 2014. Although there have been some November U.S. House races in those years between two Democrats in Los Angeles County, so far there have been no Democrat-versus-Democrat general election races in any of the U.S. House races to the south and east of Los Angeles County. Those counties include Orange, San Diego, Riverside, and San Bernardino Counties, all very populous.