[EL] ELB News and Commentary 1/30/17

Mon Jan 30 07:44:38 PST 2017

“Trump wants voter registration investigated. This is how 20 states are already doing it.”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90783>
Posted on January 30, 2017 7:36 am<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90783> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Mary Stegmaier and John Lindback<https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/01/30/trump-wants-voter-registrations-investigated-but-theres-already-a-system-for-that/?utm_term=.3b2b3db4bf89> for The Monkey Cage on ERIC.
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Posted in election administration<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>

“Trump should forget the time-wasting voter fraud claims and focus on keeping — not making — America great”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90781>
Posted on January 30, 2017 7:34 am<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90781> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

George Skelton LAT column.<http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-sac-skelton-donald-trump-voter-fraud-20170130-story.html>
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Posted in election administration<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>, The Voting Wars<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=60>

Philanthropy Roundtable Amicus Brief in 9th Circuit in Koch Brothers Disclosure Case<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90779>
Posted on January 30, 2017 7:20 am<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90779> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Release:

 The Philanthropy Roundtable filed a friend-of-the-court brief<http://s3.amazonaws.com/acrwordpress/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/30094121/Amicus-Brief-as-filed-01_30_207.pdf> Friday in the case Americans for Prosperity Foundation v. Becerra asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to uphold a federal district court’s earlier ruling that the California attorney general’s attempt to force a charitable organization to disclose its donor list is an unconstitutional burden on its First Amendment rights.
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Posted in campaign finance<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>, tax law and election law<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=22>

“We Need The PCEA More Than Ever”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90777>
Posted on January 30, 2017 7:18 am<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90777> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Doug Chapin:<http://editions.lib.umn.edu/electionacademy/2017/01/30/we-need-the-pcea-more-than-ever/>

Over the weekend – a little more than three years after its initial release – the report of the Presidential Commission on Election Administration (PCEA), and the rest of its work, was no longer available online after the new Administration decided to remove it from its home at supporttthevoter.gov<http://supportthevoter.gov/>.

The removal of the PCEA materials comes at a time when the White House is increasingly signalling that it will take steps to re-examine the 2016 election for evidence of fraud, despite no credible evidence that such fraud existed anywhere other than isolated cases, if at all. That’s unfortunate, because the PCEA is the kind of wide-ranging, bipartisan and thorough effort that any attempt to understand the American voting system needs.
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Posted in election administration<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>, PCEA (Bauer-Ginsberg Commission)<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=79>, The Voting Wars<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=60>

A Pivotal Moment for Senate Democrats<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90774>
Posted on January 29, 2017 4:58 pm<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90774> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

This week (even with the potential for a Supreme Court nomination as soon as Monday), Senate Democrats will face a pivotal choice: will they work their remaining levers of power to protest President Trump’s policies and power? Even without a filibuster for nominations, Senate Democrats can withhold unanimous consent, demand 30 hours of debate per nomination, etc.

The question is if there is any strategic reason for Senate Democrats to hold back. For example, they might be more selective if they think by doing so they can get some cooperation from Senator McCain and others.

On the other hand, with all of the street protests the last two weekends, Senate Democrats risk their base’s support by doing nothing.

Throw into the mix the upcoming Supreme Court nomination, which could get colored<https://www.buzzfeed.com/chrisgeidner/the-supreme-court-nomination-fight-might-now-be-about-trumps?utm_term=.ttB0rXELz#.fpRRQwAeg> by the refugee order and rule of law issues, and it should be a key week.
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Posted in legislation and legislatures<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=27>

“Donald Trump’s Next Big Lie”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90772>
Posted on January 29, 2017 3:51 pm<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90772> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Marc Elias<https://medium.com/@marceelias/donald-trump-next-big-lie-58eb92c3567c#.mv8qk9sj9> has posted this piece at Medium:

Before his executive order aimed at keeping US Green Card holders and refugees out of the country based on their religion, much of President Trump’s time was spent last week nursing his fixation with his popular vote loss to Hillary Clinton. In an early morning tweet<https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/824227824903090176> last Wednesday, Trump called for a “major investigation” into voter fraud, claiming that “millions” of illegal votes were cast in the 2016 General Election. As Trump’s own attorneys have recognized<http://www.michigan.gov/documents/sos/Objection_to_Recount_Petition_544089_7.pdf> — millions of illegal votes were not cast in the General Election and there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud. Trump’s concerns about voter fraud are not based on facts. Rather, they are alternative facts — aka lies — meant to confuse voters, signal Republican legislators to ramp up their efforts to enact restrictive voting laws, and provide comfort for vote suppressors.
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Posted in The Voting Wars<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=60>

“Trump ethics rules curtail lobbyists, while also loosening some Obama restrictions”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90770>
Posted on January 29, 2017 1:38 pm<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90770> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Matea Gold<https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/01/28/trumps-lobbying-ban-is-both-tougher-and-weaker-than-obamas-rules/?utm_term=.bb37ff7edeb1> for WaPo:

President Trump on Saturday signed a far-reaching ethics policy<https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/01/28/executive-order-ethics-commitments-executive-branch-appointees> that will make it harder for administration appointees to profit off their time in government as lobbyists, while also carving out loopholes that government watchdogs said will speed up Washington’s revolving door.

The presidential executive order builds off ethics rules signed by former president Barack Obama<https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2009-01-26/pdf/E9-1719.pdf> in 2009, banning executive appointees from lobbying their agencies for five years after leaving office and from lobbying anyone in the executive branch for the rest of his administration. Trump also banned appointees from ever working as lobbyists for a foreign government….

But his ethics rules also shorten the “cooling-off” period during which former appointees can communicate with the agency where they worked from two years to one. And while former lobbyists who join the government will still be banned from participating in any matter they lobbied on for two years, Trump’s order allows them to join an executive agency that they lobbied in the previous two years — something prohibited under Obama.
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Posted in conflict of interest laws<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=20>, lobbying<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=28>

Sai Prakash and John Yoo: Trump Should Reject #SCOTUS Nominee Who Would Pursue “Justice” or “Fairness”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90768>
Posted on January 29, 2017 1:29 pm<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=90768> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Quite the statement.<http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-prakash-yoo-trump-litmus-test-supreme-court-20170128-story.html>

But cf. Deuteronomy 16:20.<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shofetim_(parsha)#/media/File:Scale_of_justice.png>
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Posted in Uncategorized<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=1>

--
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
rhasen at law.uci.edu<mailto:rhasen at law.uci.edu>
http://www.law.uci.edu/faculty/full-time/hasen/
http://electionlawblog.org<http://electionlawblog.org/>

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