On May 12, one of the petitioners for Congressman John Conyers filed her own lawsuit against the Michigan law that says only registered voters can circulate candidate petitions. An additional plaintiff is a voter who wants to vote for Conyers. The case is Willis-Pittman v Johnson, e.d., 2:14cv-11903. The case is assigned to Judge Linda Parker, who has only been a federal judge since March 2014. Thanks to Thomas Jones for this news.
U.S. District Court Judge Gershwin A. Drain, an Obama appointee, will hear Davis v Johnson on Thursday, May 15, at 10 a.m. This is the case in which Robert Davis, a candidate for re-election to the Highland Park School Board, hopes to invalidate the Michigan law that requires circulators for candidate petitions to be registered voters. The School Board election is non-partisan.
The request for the hearing makes reference to Congressman John Conyers. The brief says, “Plaintiff Davis believes the Court should be aware that the question of whether Congressman John Conyers will have sufficient signatures to qualify to have his name placed on the August primary election ballot will be impacted similarly by this Court’s decision on Plaintiff Davis’ motion.”
The state’s brief is due Tuesday, May 13. It is possible the state will argue that, even if the state loses the Davis case, that has no impact on Conyers. The state might argue that there is a difference between non-partisan candidates such as Davis, and candidates running in a partisan primary such as Conyers. However, if the state does make that argument, it would seem to be a weak argument. Michigan does not have registration by party. If Michigan did have registration by party, the state could argue that only party members should be allowed to circulate candidate petitions and the only way to know if the circulator is a party member, is to require that the circulator be registered. But, without registration by party, that argument can’t be made.
On May 9, the Ninth Circuit struck down Arizona laws that prohibit candidates for state judge to engage in certain forms of political activity. The decision in Wolfson v Concannon, 11-17634, says that the state cannot prevent candidates for judge from soliciting campaign contributions, making speeches on behalf of a political party or on behalf of another candidate, or endorsing another candidate.
The decision leaves intact laws that prohibit sitting judges from doing those things. The decision was 2-1. The dissenting judge would have struck down only the ban on raising money, but left the other prohibitions intact.
Only the smaller counties in Arizona elect trial court judges. They are elected on a partisan basis.
The Nation magazine has this analysis of whether or not U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders will run for president in 2016, and, if he does, under which label. If one reads the entire article, one gathers the impression that the most likely outcome is that he will run for president, in the Democratic primaries. He has scheduled recent visits to Iowa and New Hampshire.
On May 12, Gallup released this poll, which asks voters if they are enthusiastic about voting in 2014, relative to how enthusiastic they usually are about voting. The results show a smaller percentage of voters say they are enthusiastic than for any previous midterm election going back to 1994. It appears Gallup did not do this poll in years before 1994. Thanks to Politico for the link.
