On May 25, the U.S. Senate confirmed Nancy Abudu to be a judge on the Eleventh Circuit, which covers Florida, Georgia, and Alabama. She has a long history of legal advocacy for voting rights, especially in Florida while she was with the ACLU. She has been especially active in fighting for voting rights for ex-felons, but she has been involved with ballot access also. At one point she was prepared to represent minor parties against the 2011 Florida law that requires some ballot-qualified parties to submit a very difficult petition if they want to run for president, but then she changed employers and she couldn’t proceed with that case.

The District of Columbia permits the initiative process. An initiative is about to start circulating that would provide for ranked choice voting in partisan primaries and general elections. It would also provide that independent voters are free to choose a partisan primary ballot.

Unlike initiatives for top-four and top-five, it would not eliminate the ability of parties to have nominees. Here is the text. Thanks to Fairvote for this news.

On May 4, the Iowa legislature passed HF 716, will requires all votes cast in presidential caucuses to be in-person. Caucuses are run by parties, not the government. Assuming Governor Kim Reynolds signs the bill, Iowa Democrats plan to ignore the law. The U.S. Supreme Court freedom of association cases make it clear that states cannot tell parties how to run their own caucuses.

Every vote in favor of the bill in both houses was cast by Republican legislators, and every vote against it was cast by Democrats.