[EL] ELB News and Commentary 3/15/17

Tue Mar 14 21:34:57 PDT 2017

“Report: Kansas Election Law Suppressing Turnout”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91613>
Posted on March 14, 2017 9:29 pm<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91613> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>
KCUR:<http://kcur.org/post/report-kansas-election-law-suppressing-turnout#stream/0>
Kansas’ “strictest in the nation” election law may have been written with the intent to discriminate against certain groups of voters and should be reviewed by the U.S. Department of Justice to ensure that it doesn’t violate federal law, a civil rights panel says in a report issued Tuesday.
The report, written by the Kansas Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, says that the proof of citizenship and voter ID requirements imposed by a 2011 Kansas law “may impose a substantially higher burden than that which has been previously challenged in the U.S. Supreme Court.”
Download the report from the Kansas Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.<http://mediad.publicbroadcasting.net/p/kcur/files/201703/KS-Voting-Rights-Report.pdf?_ga=1.256888651.1704001681.1484164029>
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Posted in election administration<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>

“Neil Gorsuch Has Web of Ties to Secretive Billionaire”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91611>
Posted on March 14, 2017 9:21 pm<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91611> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>
NYT:<https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/14/us/politics/neil-gorsuch-supreme-court.html>
The publicity-shy billionaire Philip F. Anschutz inherited an oil and gas firm and built it into an empire that has sprawled into telecommunications, railroads, real estate, resorts, sports teams, stadiums, movies and conservative publications like The Weekly Standard and The Washington Examiner.
Mr. Anschutz’s influence is especially felt in his home state of Colorado, where years ago Judge Neil M. Gorsuch, a Denver native, the son of a well-known Colorado Republican and now President Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, was drawn into his orbit.
As a lawyer at a Washington law firm in the early 2000s, Judge Gorsuch represented Mr. Anschutz, his companies and lower-ranking business executives as an outside counsel. In 2006, Mr. Anschutz successfully lobbied Colorado’s lone Republican senator and the Bush administration to nominate Judge Gorsuch to the federal appeals court. And since joining the court, Judge Gorsuch has been a semiregular speaker at the mogul’s annual dove-hunting retreats for the wealthy and politically prominent at his 60-square-mile Eagles Nest Ranch<http://www.eagles-nest-ranch.com/>.
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Posted in Supreme Court<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=29>

“Veteran political reporter Michael Beckel joins Issue One”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91609>
Posted on March 14, 2017 9:19 am<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91609> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>
Release:<https://www.issueone.org/veteran-political-reporter-michael-beckel-joins-issue-one/>
Veteran political reporter Michael Beckel today joined Issue One<https://www.issueone.org/> as manager of investigations, research and policy analysis.
In this role, he will lead and manage research projects related to Congress and running for office, as well as unearth the untold stories on and off Capitol Hill that deal with government ethics and political reform.
Congrats to Issue One for such a fine hire!
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Posted in election law biz<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=51>

“Fifth Circuit Judge Assails DOJ ‘Arrogance’ in Voting Rights Case”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91607>
Posted on March 14, 2017 9:18 am<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91607> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>
Texas Lawyer reports.<http://www.texaslawyer.com/id=1202781164791/Fifth-Circuit-Judge-Assails-DOJ-Arrogance-in-Voting-Rights-Case?mcode=1202615604418&slreturn=20170214121726>
My coverage of Judge Smith’s dissent in the Texas redistricting case is here <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91555> and here.<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91545>
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Posted in Department of Justice<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=26>

“15 States File Amicus Brief Seeking Clarification On NVRA, Non-Voting And List Maintenance”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91605>
Posted on March 14, 2017 7:31 am<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=91605> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>
Doug Chapin:<http://editions.lib.umn.edu/electionacademy/2017/03/14/15-states-file-amicus-brief-seeking-clarification-on-nvra-non-voting-and-list-maintenance/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+HHHElections+%28The+Election+Academy%29>
Fifteen states have filed an amicus curiae (“friend of the court”) brief<http://editions.lib.umn.edu/electionacademy/state-coalition-amicus-br-husted-v-a-philip-randolph-institute/> in the U.S. Supreme Court asking it to hear a case in order to clarify if and how states may use evidence of non-voting as a factor in removing voters from the rolls.
The question stems from an Ohio case I wrote about last April.<http://editions.lib.umn.edu/electionacademy/2016/04/07/another-electn-another-suit-new-challenge-to-ohio-voter-list-maintenance-practices/> There, plaintiffs challenged the state’s “supplemental process” for list maintenance, which uses failure to vote over a two-year period as a trigger for mailings seeking confirmation that the voter still wishes to vote. The allegation is that the use of non-voting as a trigger violates the Nation Voter Registration Act (NVRA), which expressly prohibits the removal of voters simply for failure to vote.
That argument failed to persuade the trial court to block the law, but last September a panel of the federal Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals voted 2-1<http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/electionlaw/litigation/documents/A.PhilipRandolphOpinion092316.pdf> to direct the lower court to hear the case, finding that the use of non-voting as a trigger should be understood as “resulting” in a voter’s removal for failure to vote. Ohio has petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case….
While it’s worth noting that all 15 state amici, like Ohio, have Republican chief state election officials – and thus a point of view on voter list maintenance that may be in conflict with others, including their Democratic counterparts – this is still an important issue needing clarification. Plaintiffs, and some other states, agree with the appeals court that using non-voting data to trigger confirmation mailings as part of list maintenance programs violates the law – but having clarity from the Supreme Court would likely go a long way in helping states nationwide structure their processes. Either way, what the Court decides (or lets stand by not deciding) is likely to have significant impact on states’ voter roll maintenance.
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Posted in election administration<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>, NVRA (motor voter)<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=33>, Supreme Court<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=29>, The Voting Wars<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=60>

--
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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