"Voting Rights Act to get review"

The Cincinnati Enquirer offers this report, which begins: "U.S. Rep. Steve Chabot, R-Westwood, is chairman of the House Subcommittee on the Constitution, which begins reviewing the Voting Rights Act of 1965 on Tuesday. The subcommittee expects to hold up to eight hearings through next month in order to review the act and six provisions set to expire in 2007. 'I do think that quite likely the Voting Rights Act will be reauthorized either in the same or similar form,' Chabot said Sunday."

"Ohio Members in Remap Fight"

Roll Call offers this report (paid subscription required), which begins: "With a Federal Election Commission ruling in place allowing them to raise soft money, Ohio Republican lawmakers have begun trolling for several hundred thousand dollars in hopes of defeating a November redistricting initiative that could imperil their political careers." Meanwhile Daily Kos links to this Chuck Todd column talking about redistricting measures in California and Ohio. Meanwhile Rough & Tumble links to Prop. 77 coverage here, here, here, and here. The last linked article is especially worth reading.

"Campaign Financing 'At A Crossroads' "

Eliza Newlin Carney offers this "Rules of the Game" column at National Journal on the two campaign finance cases the Supreme Court will hear in 2006. Meanwhile BNA reports (paid subscription required) that "In an unusual alliance, two prominent Democratic election lawyers are urging support for a Wisconsin anti-abortion group in a Supreme Court case that tests the limits on political advertising (Wisconsin Right to Life Inc. v. Federal Election Commission, U.S. No. 04-1581, cert. granted 9/27/05.) Attorneys Karl Sandstrom and Robert Bauer said in an Oct. 14 briefing that liberal groups should help the anti-abortion group make its case against campaign finance rules limiting television and radio ads. The Democratic lawyers said a range of so-called Section 501(c) nonprofit groups should weigh in for the Supreme Court fight by filing friend-of-the-court briefs."

"Vote Counting, Technology, and Unintended Consequences"

Michael A. Carrier has posted this draft on SSRN (forthcoming St. John's Law Review). Here is the abstract:

The 2000 presidential election had a searing effect on this nation. Few who witnessed the events in Florida could displace the images of election officials peering at punch cards, struggling to determine the intent of voters. Congress, for example, did not forget. Congress did not wish to see the scenes from Florida replayed in future elections. And so, in 2002, it enacted the Help America Vote Act, known as "HAVA," which provided $325 million to the states to replace their punch card voting systems.

Many states have enthusiastically embraced this invitation, replacing punch cards with electronic voting machines, known as direct recording electronic devices (DREs). Given the rapidly approaching 2006 deadline to upgrade, other states are currently considering such activity.

In the rush to solve one problem, however, states may be creating another, far greater, one. To be sure, DREs promise to reduce certain errors, increase access for voters with disabilities, and relieve election officials of the challenge of ascertaining the voters' intent.

But the full panoply of dangers from such systems have largely avoided scrutiny. This Article attempts to remedy this deficiency. In particular, it underscores several disturbing characteristics of electronic voting, including reduced transparency, increased magnitude of error and fraud, and lack of security controls.

I supplement the analysis of the DRE software by examining vote counting flaws in the 2004 presidential election, including machine breakdowns, vote totals that exceeded or underrepresented the number of voters who cast ballots, and incidents in which the machines switched votes from one candidate to another. I also collect circumstantial evidence such as exit polls and pre-election polls that significantly diverged from the official vote count and questionable activity in states such as Ohio. Although such evidence does not automatically prove the existence of error or fraud, it is crucial given the nontransparent nature of the vote counting process and inability to directly uncover fraud.

I conclude by offering recommendations to improve the accuracy and verifiability of vote counting today. In particular, I propose for electronic voting machines a voter-verified paper trail, random audits, open source software, and other recommendations. Only after these proposals are adopted can voters have confidence that the promise of vote counting technology will match its perils.

LA Times Suprisingly Endorses Prop. 75 (Union Dues Measure)

See here.

White House on Miers and the Voting Rights Act

From the October 14 White House Press Briefing:

MR. McCLELLAN: You jumped in before I finished, because the second part of this is what I was just saying, that she will go before the Senate Judiciary Committee and they will have an opportunity to ask her questions, and she will answer those questions in the appropriate manner. And she looks forward to that opportunity so that people can come to know her.

Now, you mentioned constitutional law experience. She has deep knowledge of the Constitution and constitutional law. Among the constitutional law matters that a White House Counsel has to deal with on a daily basis include laws governing war powers, Commander-in-Chief powers, pardons, executive privilege, the appointments clause, the commerce clause, the 1st Amendment, 4th Amendment, which relates to the Patriot Act, the 14th Amendment, and many other areas. So these are issues that a White House Counsel deals with on a daily basis. These are complex constitutional issues that a White House Counsel has to deal with.

And she's -- I would also point out that she is the -- she would be the only Supreme Court Justice who has actually had to comply with the Voting Rights Act and the Constitution in drawing a redistricting map, because she served as a city councilwoman in Dallas, and so she had firsthand experience with constitutional issues when she was on the Dallas City Council.

"Panel Supports Renewal of Voting Rights Act"

Fox News offers this report.

"Signatures pose formidable challenge for third-party candidates"

A.P. offers this report from Pennsylvania.

Congratulations to Election Law Prof. Spencer Overton and Family

...on the birth of their newest child.

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