The Commission on Presidential Debates and the other defendants in Gary Johnson et al v Commission on Presidential Debates have recently won permission to delay their Answer. The new deadline for their Answer is January 8, 2016. The Defendants include not only the CPD, but President Obama, Mitt Romney, and the Republican and Democratic National Committees.
On December 2, the Florida Supreme Court issued an opinion in League of Women Voters v Detzner, SC14-1905. Here is the 5-2 decision, which (including the dissents) is 127 pages long.
The majority agrees with the lower state court’s plan for new boundaries. The basis for the lawsuit is the Florida Constitution, which tells the legislature to draw the boundaries, but also tells the legislature not to let partisan considerations affect those lines. Earlier the state courts had determined that the plan passed by the 2011 session of the legislature actually was strongly influenced by a desire to help Republican nominees. The legislature has a Republican majority.
On December 2, two organizations that advocate for voting rights filed a lawsuit against Alabama’s requirement that voters at the polls must show certain kinds of government photo-ID. The case is Birmingham Ministries and NAACP v State of Alabama, northern district, 2:15cv-2193. The case was assigned to U.S. District Court Judge L. Scott Coogler, a Bush Jr. appointee. Thanks to Rick Hasen for this news. Here is the Complaint.
Johns Creek, Georgia, held run-off elections for city council on December 1. Chris Coughlin, a Libertarian Party member, won the race for the special term, for city council post 2. But he lost the race for the full term. He won the special election with 59.1% of the vote but was defeated for the full term seat with 47.5%. See this story. Thanks to IndependentPoliticalReport for this news.
The Tennessee Secretary of State says 14 Republicans and 3 Democrats will be on the presidential primary ballot. See this story for a list of the names. Presidential candidates get on the primary ballot either by being discussed in major news media, or by submitting 2,500 signatures of registered voters. No candidate submitted a petition.
The 2016 Republican presidential primary will have more names than any past Tennessee presidential primary. Before 2016, the most crowded presidential primary ballot in Tennessee had been the 2004 Democratic ballot, which had eleven names. The Republican presidential primary ballots had had 10 in 2012, 2008, and 1996.
