According to this Los Angeles Times story, the Iowa Democratic Party is likely to revise rules for the presidential caucus, so that voters who can’t attend in person may still participate. The Iowa major party presidential caucuses have been criticized in the past for making it impossible for some party members, especially members of the armed services overseas, to participate. Thanks to PoliticalWire for the link.
On July 1, at 11:13 a.m., the California Secretary of State posted election returns from the June 3 primary, including the State Controller race. Here are the results. One Democrat, Betty Yee, defeated another Democrat for second place by only 481 votes, out of over 4,000,000 cast.
On July 1, some Mississippi voters who support Chris McDaniel for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate filed a federal lawsuit, to help them obtain evidence that the June 24 run-off results should be overturned. True the Vote v Hosemann and the Republican Party of Mississippi, northern district, 3:14cv-144.
The June 24 Republican runoff results are not official yet, but unofficially the count is: Thad Cochran 190,481; McDaniel 183,601. Mississippi law does not permit voters who voted in the primary of one party to then participate in the run-off primary of another party. McDaniel supporters believe that this law was not enforced. Here is the Complaint. The case was assigned to U.S. District Court Judge Michael P. Mills, who was a Republican state representative in Mississippi 1984-1995 and then a member of the Mississippi Supreme Court 1995-2001. He is also noted for presiding over the trial of Byron De La Beckwith, who was convicted years later for the murder of Medgar Evers.
The group of voters complains that they are being denied access to the voter registration records, and the poll books that show which voters voted in each party’s primary. The case is in federal court because the federal “Motor-Voter” law of 1993 says that such records must be public.
At the first primary, on June 3, the total vote cast in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate was 318,902, a considerably smaller number than the 375,000 who voted in the runoff. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link. UPDATE: the federal law, sec. 1973gg-6, says, “(i) Public disclosure of voter registration activities. (1) Each State shall maintain for at least 2 years and shall make available for public inspection and, where available, photocopying at a reasonable cost, all records concerning the implementation of programs and activities conducted for the purpose of ensuring the accuracy and currency of official lists of eligible voters, except to the extent that such records relate to a declination to register to vote or to the identity of a voter registration agency through which any particular voter is registered. (2) The records maintained pursuant to paragraph (1) shall include lists of the names and addresses of all persons to whom notices described in subsection (d)(2) of this section are sent, and information concerning whether or not each such person has responded to the notice as of the date that inspection of the records is made.” Thanks to Thessalia Merivaki for the text of the federal law.
On July 1, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear Reed v Town of Gilbert, 13-502. The issue is whether the First Amendment allows local governments to put size and time limits on certain kinds of signs, and vastly more permissive limits on other types of signs. The government being sued is Gilbert, Arizona. The town permits political signs to be 32 square feet, and Homeowners Association signs advertising events and festivals to be 80 square feet. But a sign intended to direct passersby to other kinds of events must be no larger than 6 square feet.
In addition, political signs may remain in place for months, but certain other types of signs that refer to events can be posted only 12 hours before the event, and must be taken down one hour after the event. The case was brought by a small church congregation that does not have its own church building; instead it meets in schools. The church says it depends on its own signs to inform passersby of its services. Here is the cert petition. The church filed its cert petition on October 21, 2013. The oral argument will be late in 2014 or early in 2015. The town justifies the sign restrictions on the basis of safety and aesthetics.
On June 30, the South Dakota Secretary of State ruled that independent candidates are not permitted to run for statewide executive positions other than Governor and Lieutenant Governor. The basis for the ruling is statutory interpretation. The officials who made the ruling don’t seem to be aware that in 1974, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Storer v Brown, 415 US 724, at page 745, that states must permit independent candidates to run for any partisan office.
The matter arose in South Dakota when Joy Howe told the Secretary of State that she wishes to run as an independent candidate for Secretary of State, and asked for information about the procedures.
