[EL] ELB News and Commentary 5/6/15

Wed May 6 07:50:20 PDT 2015

    “Cash flows in year of SuperPAC 2.0″
    <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72267>

Posted onMay 6, 2015 7:48 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72267>byRick 
Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Tarini Parti 
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/cash-flows-in-year-of-superpac-20-117612.html?hp=b1_c1>for 
Politico:

    The 2016 presidential race has already become the super PAC 2.0
    election.
    The election will likely break all outside spending records, but
    it’s the experimental nature of how that money is raised and spent
    that will have a lasting effect on future elections.

     From the types of committees created to the timing and number of
    outside money vehicles involved, with billionaire donors now
    watching more closely than ever before, supporters of presidential
    hopefuls have added innovative twists to how they raise and spend
    outside money. They are going one step beyond the model supporters
    of President Barack Obama and Republican Mitt Romney used in 2012 –
    the first presidential election that used super PACs.

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Posted incampaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>

    “Voter ID Nonsense” <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72265>

Posted onMay 6, 2015 7:45 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72265>byRick 
Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Toledo Blade editoria 
<http://www.toledoblade.com/Featured-Editorial-Home/2015/05/06/Voter-ID-nonsense.html>l:

    Ohioans face serious threats to the integrity of our democracy:
    income inequality, partisan gerrymandering, big-money politics.
    Voter fraud is not among these threats.

    Yet rather than address such pressing concerns, Republicans in the
    state House are again taking up a bill that would require Ohioans to
    present photo identification when they vote. This unnecessary
    measure would do nothing to make elections more secure. But it would
    do much to keep voters, especially poor and minority Ohioans, away
    from the polls.

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Posted inelection administration 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>,The Voting Wars 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=60>,voter id 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=9>

    “Williams-Yulee — The Ruling Few Expected . . . & the One Few Will
    Remember” <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72263>

Posted onMay 6, 2015 7:42 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72263>byRick 
Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

More Ron Collins 
<http://concurringopinions.com/archives/2015/05/fan-59-first-amendment-news-williams-yulee-the-ruling-few-expected-the-one-few-will-remember.html>on 
Williams-Yulee.

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Posted injudicial elections <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=19>,Supreme 
Court <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=29>

    Neuborne on Williams-Yulee <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72261>

Posted onMay 6, 2015 7:40 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72261>byRick 
Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Here 
<http://www.acslaw.org/acsblog/the-limits-of-the-williams-yulee-opinion>at 
ACS.

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Posted incampaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>,federal 
election commission <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=24>

    Bertrall Ross Reviews Robert Post’s Citizens Divided Book in
    Michigan Law Review <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72259>

Posted onMay 6, 2015 7:36 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72259>byRick 
Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Here. <http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2598393>

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Posted incampaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>,Supreme 
Court <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=29>

    Is FEC Dysfunction New? <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72257>

Posted onMay 6, 2015 7:34 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72257>byRick 
Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

NYT reports on record low fines at the FEC. 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/06/us/politics/fec-says-campaign-fines-hit-record-low-in-2014.html?_r=2>

For those who responded to Eric Lichtblau’s earlier report by saying 
that the FEC was always gridlocked and dysfunctional, it’s just not 
true.  It never had great enforcement powers, but there was much more 
cooperation on rulemaking, and much more agreement on enforcement 
matters.  (Here’s some evidence fromMichael Franz. 
<http://www.law.uci.edu/lawreview/vol3/no3/franz.pdf>)

In my view, we can trace origins of the new era of dysfunction to Don 
McGahn.

It is an ideological split, in the sense that Republican commissioners 
consistently vote for less regulation and Democrats for more, but it is 
partisan in the sense that Republicans tend to believe that deregulation 
works in their favor and Democrats believe it works against them. The 
two cannot be separated.

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Posted incampaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>,federal 
election commission <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=24>

    “Denver Shows Off ‘Ballot Delivery’ System to National Audience”
    <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72255>

Posted onMay 6, 2015 7:22 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72255>byRick 
Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

A 
ChapinBlog<http://blog.lib.umn.edu/cspg/electionacademy/2015/05/denver_shows_off_ballot_delive.php>(with 
great pic).

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Posted inelection administration <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>

    “Free Speech For Me, But Not For Thee; Progressives have
    successfully transformed the First Amendment’s restrictions on
    government into an instrument of government speech control.”
    <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72253>

Posted onMay 6, 2015 7:19 am <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72253>byRick 
Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Paul Jossey writes 
<http://thefederalist.com/2015/05/06/free-speech-for-me-but-not-for-thee/>for 
The Federalist.

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Posted incampaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>,Supreme 
Court <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=29>

    Mike Huckabee Jokingly Breaks Federal Election Law
    <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72251>

Posted onMay 5, 2015 7:33 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72251>byRick 
Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

WSJ 
<http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2015/05/05/huckabees-pitch-whether-joke-or-not-at-odds-with-federal-election-law/>:

    Mr. Huckabee said his campaign would be funded by “working people
    who will find out that $15 and $25 a month contributions can take us
    from Hope to higher ground,” he said, a reference to Hope, Ark.,
    where he was speaking. But, he cracked: “Rest assured, if you want
    to give a million dollars, please do it.”

That’s illegal whether he’s asking for his own committee (limited to 
$2,700 per election) or for a Super PAC (which can take unlimited 
donations, but per FEC rule a candidate cannot ask for someone to donate 
more than $5,000 to a Super PAC).

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Posted incampaign finance <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>,campaigns 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=59>

    “Register Minority Voters in Georgia, Go to Jail”
    <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72249>

Posted onMay 5, 2015 3:42 pm <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=72249>byRick 
Hasen <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Spencer Woodman reports 
<http://www.newrepublic.com/article/121715/georgia-secretary-state-hammers-minority-voter-registration-efforts>for 
TNR.  It includes this:

    Last month, Brian Kemptold the
    <http://www.ajc.com/news/news/state-regional-govt-politics/georgia-elections-official-resigns-over-misidentif/nkmSY/>/Atlanta
    Journal Constitution/that his elections director, Linda Ford, was
    resigning at his request because of a “technical error” that caused
    nearly 8,000 voters to be improperly removed from the rolls. “It was
    an honest mistake by a hard-working person and, unfortunately, she
    has to pay the price,” Kemp said.

    In response to questions about Ford’s resignation, Kemp’s office
    provided me with a 60-page report detailing the findings an internal
    investigation into the incident. It found the cancellation of the
    thousands of voters “could be a potential violation” of the National
    Voter Registration Act, a federal law meant to help ensure equal
    access to the ballot box. The law requires that a state cannot move
    voters off the rolls within 90 days of an election. Kemp’s office
    had struck thousands of voters, mostly in Georgia’s Richmond County,
    from the rolls six days past this key federal deadline.

    Kemp has called the issue
    <http://www.11alive.com/story/news/local/downtown/2015/04/03/elections-director-linda-ford-resigns/25246917/>“very
    serious.” But in public statements, he elided the fact that his own
    office may have violated federal law. Instead, he has emphasized
    that the action was a mistake. The report his office released to me
    states that the matter was discovered only after Project Vote, a
    non-profit group that seeks to increase voter participation among
    low-income and minority voters, requested a related records.

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Posted inelection administration 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>,NVRA (motor voter) 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=33>,The Voting Wars 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=60>,voter registration 
<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=37>

-- 
Rick Hasen
Chancellor's Professor of Law and Political Science
UC Irvine School of Law
401 E. Peltason Dr., Suite 1000
Irvine, CA 92697-8000
949.824.3072 - office
949.824.0495 - fax
rhasen at law.uci.edu
http://www.law.uci.edu/faculty/full-time/hasen/
http://electionlawblog.org

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