news of the day 2/9/05

"Former GOP Consultant Gets 5 Months in Phone-Jamming Case"

A.P. offers this report, which begins: ""CONCORD, N.H. -- A former Republican consultant was sentenced Tuesday to five months in jail for jamming Democratic telephone lines in several New Hampshire cities during the 2002 general election."

"Committee Examines 2004 Election Reforms"

A.P. offers this report.

End of NY State Senate Election Dispute

See this New York Times report. Thanks to Doug Greene for the link.

Toner-Thomas Letter to Congress on Reforming the Presidential Public Financing System

You can find it here.

Ohio Voting Equipment in Election 2004

Dan Tokaji, whose excellent "Equal Vote blog" just had its first birthday, writes How Did Ohio's Voting Equipment Fare in 2004? A snippet:

The table also indicates the type of system that each county uses for in-precinct voting. In 2004, the counties that used each of the three types of equipment for in-precinct voting had the following residual vote rates:
Type of Voting Equipment Residual Vote Rate
Punch Card 1.84%
Electronic 1.25%
Optical Scan 1.01%

A $100,000 Donation to a Ballot Committee the Governor Favors Gets You a Seat---Literally---At the Governor's Table

See this Los Angeles Times report.

Redistricting, Competition and Entrenchment

Responding to reports that congressional Republicans in California don't like Gov. Schwarzenegger's proposed redistricting plan that would create more competitive districts, David Gillard reportedly is trying to persuade the governor's team to leave congressional districting out of the reform package.

This would present some very interesting questions of intent and partisan gerrymandering. How would a state defend a redistricting plan pushed by a Republican governor that makes redistricting competitive when it comes to the Democratically controlled legislature, but declines to impose competition when it could hurt Republicans in Congress?

Keene on California Election Administration Reform

Responding to my call for California to move to nonpartisan election administration at the state level, Barry Keene offers his own model to achieve the goals of neutrality and accountability. Meanwhile, Dan Walters reports: "Legislative leaders are virtually begging Schwarzenegger to appoint a caretaker who wouldn't seek election to a new term in 2006, but he's planning to name a Republican - perhaps a Latino - who would, in fact, run in 2006 and begin rebuilding the otherwise nonexistent bench of statewide GOP political figures."

-- 
Rick Hasen
Professor of Law and William M. Rains Fellow
Loyola Law School
919 Albany Street
Los Angeles, CA  90015-1211
(213)736-1466
(213)380-3769 - fax
rick.hasen@lls.edu
http://www.lls.edu/academics/faculty/hasen.html
http://electionlawblog.org