On March 17, the 11th circuit heard DiMaio v Democratic National Committee. This is the case that says there must be some constitutional protection for Democratic voters in Florida, for input into the presidential selection process. The 3 judges seemed to indicate that they will remand the case back to the U.S. District Court. The District Court had ruled that the plaintiff lacks standing.
The U.S. Supreme Court will again think about whether to hear Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, on March 21, with the news to be announced (probably) on March 24. This is a challenge to part of the federal campaign finance laws.
Although the U.S. Supreme Court put out a non-election law decision on March 19, it did not release the Indiana photo ID decision. The next opinions will be next week.
On March 18, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Washington state Top-Two Initiative passed by the voters of Washington state in 2004. The vote was 7-2. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the decision. Justices Antonin and Anthony Kennedy dissented. The Court said nothing about the points raised by the Washington Libertarian Party, which were that this type of primary in effect provides a November ballot with only Democrats and Republicans on the ballot, except that footnote eleven says the Court did not consider the Libertarian arguments because the lower courts had not ruled on them either (the lower courts didn’t rule on them either because the lower courts were invalidating the law for other reasons, so they said it wasn’t necessary to consider the Libertarian points).
The majority decision says parties are free to file a new as-applied challenge after the system has been used once. UPDATE: here is a link to the opinion.
She just announced and is already considered a front-runner, according to Third Party Watch.
On March 17, the US Supreme Court accepted Bartlett v Strickland, the North Carolina districting case.
