On March 20, Maine LD 1799 passed the Joint Legal and Veterans Affairs Committee. The bill legalizes fusion.
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On March 24, the Democratic National Committee voted to approve Puerto Rico’s Democratic presidential primary, which will be held June 1, a Sunday. Puerto Rico has used caucuses for the last 20 years, but Puerto Rico Democrats felt that this year’s Democratic contest is of such intense interest, the normal caucus procedure would not work well. Thanks to Thomas Jones for this news.
On the afternoon of March 24, the U.S. Supreme Court heard Riley v Kennedy, a case that interprets the federal Voting Rights Act. Here is an AP story about how the argument went.
Back on February 1, a U.S. District Court in Oregon had ruled that signers of initiative or referendum petitions do not have a due process right to have their signatures counted. Plaintiffs have filed an appeal with the 9th circuit. The case is Lemons v Bradbury, 08-35209.
On March 24, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, 07-953. This is the case brought by people who wanted to make and advertise a film that would be shown in theaters and would try to make a profit. Yet the subject of the film would be to attack Hillary Clinton. The group wanted to be free of campaign finance reporting requirements.
Technically, the Court ruled that it doesn’t have jurisdiction to hear this case, because of procedural problems. This is slightly different than merely choosing not to hear the case.