Leamington, Ontario, will hold its election for city officers in October 2014, and all votes will be cast on the internet. See this story. Individuals who do not have access to a computer can vote on the computer at city hall or at the city recreation center. All elections for city offices in Canada are non-partisan.
Leamington is on the north shore of Lake Erie, and is the most southerly city in Canada. Its population is 28,403. Thanks to Michael Drucker for this news.
On April 22, the California Senate Elections Committee will hear SCA 16. This is the proposed state constitutional amendment to eliminate special elections when a vacancy occurs in the legislature. The proposal would let the Governor appoint someone of the same political “preference” as the original legislator. If the legislature passes this bill, then the voters would vote on the idea. The bill needs a two-thirds vote in the legislature.
April 4, a U.S. District Court in Corpus Christi, Texas, ordered Texas to produce internal legislative e-mails concerning the 2011 bill to require voters at the polls to show government photo-ID. The Judge said this evidence is needed to determine if one motivation for the bill was to make it more difficult for Hispanics to vote. The case is Veasey v Perry, southern district, 2:13cv-193. See this Brad Blog article about the court order.
On April 4, Georgia asked the Eleventh Circuit to stay its opinion in Green Party of Georgia v Kemp. The Eleventh Circuit had said earlier this year that a trial should be held in U.S. District Court over whether the state’s presidential ballot access law is unconstitutionally difficult. Georgia state government attorneys are so eager to avoid such a trial, they say they will ask the U.S. Supreme Court to cancel the order for a trial.
The state’s request for a stay says that the plaintiffs, including the Green Party of Georgia and the Constitution Party of Georgia, filed nothing to suggest that the parties could possibly win the lawsuit. The state’s claim is not true. The plaintiffs already filed evidence that no presidential petition has succeeded in Georgia (neither minor party nor independent) since 2000. The U.S. Supreme Court has said several times that when a ballot access law is so difficult it is seldom used, then it is probably unconstitutional.
On April 7, the U.S. Supreme Court remanded James v Federal Election Commission, 12-683, back to the U.S. District Court and told that lower court to re-do its opinion, in light of the U.S. Supreme Court McCutcheon opinion. James v FEC is a challenge to the amount of money that an individual can donate to all candidates for federal office. Virginia James was willing to accept the total ceiling on all contributions that an individual can make to federal candidates, political parties, and PAC’s put together, but she wanted to distribute the contributions so that her total contributions to all candidates exceeded the limit for all candidates combined.
It is obvious that she will win her case, given the more far-reaching decision last week in McCutcheon v FEC.
