AP reports: The Texas Democratic Party was sued Friday by Latino advocacy groups that contend the complicated primary and caucus system used in the March 4 presidential primary unfairly diluted Latino votes.

The League of United Latin American Citizens of Texas and the Mexican American Bar Association of Houston sued in federal court, arguing the party failed to seek clearance required by the U.S. Justice Department for the so-called Texas Two Step. The groups also argue the system effectively discriminates against Latino voters by giving them fewer delegates.

Texas Democrats distribute the state s 193 delegates using both a primary election and a caucus, but the distribution favors state Senate districts that had high voter turnout in the last presidential and gubernatorial elections.

In the March 4 election, that meant predominantly Hispanic districts, where turnout was low in 2004 and 2006, got fewer delegates than others, particularly urban, predominantly black districts. Latino districts favored Hillary Clinton; black districts favored Barack Obama. -- LULAC sued Texas Democratic Party over primary delegates - El Paso Times

Note: If anyone has a copy of the complaint, email it to me.

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The Detroit Free Press reports: An attorney from Geoffrey Fieger’s law office, called as a prosecution witness to testify in the high profile lawyer’s federal trial for alleged illegal political fund-raising, told jurors today that he’d followed the same practices throughout his 24-year career.

“I’ve done exactly what I’ve done at the Fieger firm that’s the subject of this litigation on numerous occasions through my legal career at another firm,” Jeffrey Danzig testified on direct examination.

Fieger and partner Vernon (Ven) Johnson are charged with breaking campaign finance laws. Money was collected from employees, friends, relatives and other for the 2004 John Edwards presidential bid and the donations were then reimbursed by law firm checks.

The times he’d done the same thing while at the Lopatin-Miller law office were “too many to count,” Danzing said in later cross-examination. -- Attorney working for Fieger: I've followed the same practices for 24 years

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The New York Times reports: Groups planning parades or protests at the Democratic National Convention filed a lawsuit here on Friday charging that the Secret Service and the City of Denver are threatening free speech — not because of tight security rules, but by the very lack of them.

The suit, filed in Federal District Court, says that delays in establishing legal parade routes, and unanswered questions about security arrangements around the convention center, are undermining efforts to plan for events when Democrats gather here from Aug. 25 to 28.

Mark Silverstein, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado, which is representing 12 groups in the lawsuit, said they had no choice but to turn to the court. With just four months until the convention, the groups want a judge to speed the scheduling and the issuing of rules governing activities outside the Pepsi Center.

At the Democratic convention in Boston in 2004, First Amendment challenges could not be addressed by judges, Mr. Silverstein said, because security measures were announced too late. -- Convention Preparations Prompt Suit by A.C.L.U. - New York Times

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From a press release via email: Today, the parties to LWV v. Browning, a lawsuit challenging Florida’s onerous restrictions on third-party voter registration, entered into a binding agreement filed in federal court. The agreement comes the day after plaintiffs sought a temporary restraining order that would have barred state authorities from enforcing the restrictions. Under the agreement, Secretary of State Kurt S. Browning stated that he will not enforce the restrictions until the administrative rulemaking process is completed, which he estimates will occur no earlier than early July 2008. As a result, groups and individuals who conduct voter registration drives in Florida can proceed with their voter registration activities without fear of being fined under the law, until at least early July 2008.

Plaintiffs to the lawsuit, League of Women Voters of Florida, the Florida AFL-CIO, and Marilyn Wills, president of the Tallahassee League of Women Voters, are thrilled with this result.

Plaintiffs are represented by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law and the Advancement Project, and by pro bono counsel Debevoise & Plimpton (representing the League of Women Voters of Florida), and Becker & Poliakoff, P.A.

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The Leaf Chronicle reports: A Clarksville woman has been arrested on three counts of illegal voting.

Carla Thomas Smith, 36, who gave a 718-1/2 Central Ave. address, was booked Friday into the Montgomery County Jail and has since been released on a $1,000 bond.

According to court documents, Smith has a felony conviction, which deprives her of voting rights. ...

The indictment against Smith alleges she broke the law when she registered to vote in August 2004, when she voted in November 2004 and when she voted in November 2006. -- Woman arrested on 3 counts of illegal voting | theleafchronicle.com | The Leaf Chronicle

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Ars Techinca reports: In a decision issued last week, superior court judge Linda R. Feinberg ruled that a technical review of voting machines used in New Jersey may proceed despite the objections of the manufacturer, Sequoia Voting Systems.

Serious problems emerged in five counties where Sequoia voting machines were used during the New Jersey presidential primaries. Audits conducted by election officials revealed that the electronic tallies didn t match the total counts from the paper trail generated by the machines. Sequoia attributes the problem to operator error and argued that it isn t indicative of a technical malfunction.

In response to that glitch and other irregularities, election officials from Union County decided decided to subject the voting machines to an independent review. They went to Ed Felten, a voting machine security expert who serves as the director of Princeton s Center for Information Technology Policy. Although preliminary evidence from the audit indicated the potential presence of some serious malfunctions, Union County decided not to go forward with the review after receiving legal threats from Sequoia. The voting machine company claimed that an unauthorized third-party review would violate the county s license agreement. Sequoia also argued that unauthorized examinations expose the its proprietary trade secrets to public disclosure and threaten its intellectual property rights. -- Review of NJ e-voting approved; won t be in time for election

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The Detroit News reports: A lawyer who works for indicted Southfield attorney Geoffrey Fieger testified Monday that Fieger s law firm reimbursed him for $8,000 in political donations he made on behalf of himself, his wife, and his two college-age children.

But attorney Paul Broschay testified he was not promised he would be reimbursed for the checks he wrote to the 2004 presidential campaign of Democrat John Edwards and would have donated to the Edwards campaign even if partners at the firm had not asked him to do so. He did not think he did anything illegal, Broschay told a jury in U.S. District Court.

Fieger, 57, and his law partner, Ven Johnson, 46, were indicted in 2007 on conspiracy and illegal campaign contribution charges. They are accused of making $127,000 in illegal donations to the Edwards campaign by reimbursing employees, employee relatives and law firm vendors. Fieger is also charged with obstruction of justice, a 10-year felony. Both have pleaded not guilty. -- Fieger paid for political donation, lawyer testifies

The Detroit Free Press explains how he can to testify: Paul Broschay, a former Detroit and Trenton police officer, said agents came to his home under the guise of serving a grand jury subpoena, but proceeded to play "good cop, bad cop" in hopes of getting him to say something damaging about Fieger and his law partner, Vernon (Ven) Johnson. Both men are on trial in U.S. District Court in Detroit on charges of illegally reimbursing 64 employees, friends, family members and vendors to contribute $127,000 to Edwards' ill-fated campaign.

Broschay said he tried to cooperate at first, but asked the agents to leave after his daughter, then a Michigan State University student, called home and was hysterical because agents confronted her in her apartment.

"It kinda pissed me off," said Broschay, who testified under a grant of immunity from federal prosecutors. -- Agents bullied me, Fieger lawyer says

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The New York Times reports: The League of Women Voters of Florida sued state election officials on Monday to challenge a law that fines voter registration groups for losing registration forms or returning them late.

The lawsuit, filed in Federal District Court here, is likely to amplify the political battle over a handful of laws that have tightened the rules for registration and voting in Florida.

It comes less than two weeks after the league suspended its registration drive, fearing penalties of up to $1,000 per volunteer. And in its complaint, the group said the law “severely burdens efforts by the league and other plaintiffs to encourage civic engagement and strengthen democracy.”

State officials have defended the law as an effort to preserve the integrity of the voter registration process. Jennifer Krell Davis, communications director for Secretary of State Kurt S. Browning, said Monday that she could not comment on the league’s complaint because she had not yet received it. -- Voting Group Sues Florida Over Penalties - New York Times

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The New York Times reports: The Supreme Court upheld Indiana’s voter identification law on Monday, concluding in a splintered decision that the challengers failed to prove that the law’s photo ID requirement placed an unconstitutional burden on the right to vote.

The 6-to-3 ruling kept the door open to future lawsuits that provided more evidence. But this theoretical possibility was small comfort to the dissenters or to critics of voter ID laws, who predicted that a more likely outcome than successful lawsuits would be the spread of measures that would keep some legitimate would-be voters from the polls.

Voting experts said the ruling was likely to complicate election administration, leading to both more litigation and more legislation, at least in states with Republican legislative majorities, but would probably have a limited impact on this year’s presidential voting.

The issue has been intensely partisan, with Republicans supporting increased identification requirements for voters and Democrats opposing them. In what the court described as the “lead opinion,” which was written by Justice John Paul Stevens and joined by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, the court acknowledged that the record of the case contained “no evidence” of the type of voter fraud the law was ostensibly devised to detect and deter, the effort by a voter to cast a ballot in another person’s name. ...

The three others who made up the majority, Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, and Samuel A. Alito Jr., said in an opinion by Justice Scalia that the law was so obviously justified as “a generally applicable, nondiscriminatory voting regulation” that there was no basis for scrutinizing the record to assess the impact on any individual voters. “This is an area where the dos and don’ts need to be known in advance of the election,” Justice Scalia said. -- In a 6-to-3 Vote, Justices Uphold a Voter ID Law

Nina Totenberg on NPR has a good roundup of interviews with Rick Hasen, Pam Karlan, and others.

The Washington Post had a live discussion with Roy Schotland yesterday. The Post has an article today.

Joan Biskupic has an article in USA Today.

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TalkLeft reports: Flamboyant attorney and legal analyst Geoff Fieger, perhaps best known for his defense of Dr. Jack Kevorkian, is on trial in federal court in Detroit. He and his law partner, Van Johnson, are charged with having employees at their law firm and others donate to John Edwards' presidential campaign and then reimbursing them, in violation of federal campaign laws. Fieger is also charged with obstruction of justice for allegedly concealing a memo and tampering with grand jury witnesses. -- Gerry Spence Opens for Fieger in MI Criminal Trial - TalkLeft: The Politics Of Crime

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Philly.com reports: Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge Ramy Djerassi has rejected a request to extend Philadelphia poll hours to 10 p.m., and to distribute emergency paper ballots to all precincts where there have been reports of broken voting machines. -- Judge: Polls Will Close As Scheduled | Philly | 04/22/2008

Voter Action, a national voter rights group, has asked a Philadelphia judge to extend voting hours tonight until 10 p.m., and to use paper ballots at all voting places where broken machines have been reported. The city's Board of Elections seems certain to object. The hearing is expected to begin momentarily. -- Voter Group Requests Extended Poll Hours

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Politiker NJ reports: Rob Andrews wants to render Frank Lautenberg’s county line advantage obsolete.

Andrews announced today that he’s filing suit against 13 mostly northern county clerks to seek a “fair and open Democratic primary” that requires county clerks give “fair and equal” ballot position to both U.S. Senate candidates at the State Superior Court. The challenge was first reported on the liberal Web site Blue Jersey.

While Andrews has the county line in seven southern counties, Lautenberg has the line in the 12 other counties that award it -- a big advantage in a primary with an expected low turnout.

Andrews cited a state statute, N.J.S.A. 19:23-26.1, that says primary candidates for Senate or Governor must appear in the first column and apart from candidates for lower offices. -- Andrews sues for an open primary | Politicker NJ

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The Birmingham News reports:
A panel of three federal judges granted Gov. Bob Riley s request Wednesday to extend George Bowman s tenure as a Jefferson County commissioner, but not for as long as the governor wanted.

Riley now has until May 19 to get clearance from the U.S. Department of Justice for his appointment of Bowman to the District 1 vacancy on the County Commission. ...

Last week Riley asked the federal panel to extend its deadline until after the U.S. Supreme Court and Alabama Supreme Court decide separate cases challenging the governor's contention that only he has the authority to fill vacancies when commissioners leave office early.

In Wednesday's order, the judges denied Riley that much time, but said a shorter extension is reasonable. -- George Bowman gets one-month extension as Jefferson County commissioner- al.com

Note and Disclosure: I am one of the attorneys for the plaintiff. The order is
here.

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Update: Steve Rankin has sent me a link to the complaint.

Free Citizen blog reports: In an open primary, a party's primary ballot is available to any voter who wants it. There are two types of open primaries: Mississippi is one of the 13 states with "open primary, public record," meaning that each primary voter's choice of party is publicly recorded. Idaho, in contrast, is one of the eight states with "open primary, private choice": each primary voter picks a party in secret, and no record is made of this choice. ...

The recently-ended session of the heavily-Republican Idaho legislature failed to pass legislation modifying the primary election law. The Senate did pass a bill, 20-15, to switch to "open primary, public record," but the House refused to consider it. The Republican governor opposes changing the primary setup, as the state GOP chairman also steadfastly has. The chairman is up for re-election at the state convention in June, and he may have a contest from former state Sen. Rod Beck, who has spearheaded the efforts to change the primary election law.

Late Friday, the Republican Party filed a new federal lawsuit against the state-mandated open primary. The Idaho GOP will be able to cite U. S. District Judge Allen Pepper's 2007 ruling that Mississippi's open primary law is unconstitutional. If the 5th U. S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans agrees with Pepper, the Idaho Republicans will also be able to cite that decision. Mississippi Democratic Party v. Barbour. -- Free Citizen: Idaho Republicans Again Challenge Open Primary Law

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Update: The suit has been filed and the complaint is available here.

UPI reports: The Democratic National Committee wants to get its dispute with John McCain s campaign on public financing into the U.S. courts, party officials said.

The committee plans to file suit Monday, asking the U.S. District Court in Washington to order the Federal Election Commission to investigate McCain s decision to reject public financing for the primary, The New York Times reported.

The six-member commission has four vacancies and is unable to take any action because it cannot meet with a quorum. The Democratic majority in Congress has objected to some of President George W. Bush s reappointments. -- Democrats want to sue McCain over loan - UPI.com

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The Charleston Gazette reports: Anonymous advertising in West Virginia political campaigns would open the door for a repeat of the 2004 Supreme Court race, where voters did not learn until later who was spending millions of dollars on behalf of candidates, several lawyers told a federal judge Wednesday.

But the Center for Individual Freedom argued that West Virginia s election laws - which require the group to disclose its donors if it buys political advertising - violate its free speech rights under the First Amendment.

The Virginia-based organization asked U.S. District Judge David A. Faber to grant it an injunction allowing it to advertise in the upcoming state Supreme Court election without disclosing its spending or its donors. The state s primary election is May 13.

Last month, the center filed a lawsuit against the state s top election official, Secretary of State Betty Ireland. Mercer County Prosecuting Attorney Timothy Boggess was also NAMEd in the suit as a representative of all the state s prosecutors.

Three of the four Democratic candidates for state Supreme Court have joined in fighting the injunction, as have the West Virginia AFL-CIO, the state Education Association, the Council of Churches and other groups. -- Lawyers argue over rules for political ads

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The Arizona Republic reports: The boundaries of the state s legislative districts for this fall s elections will remain the same as they have been for the past three years.

That s the immediate impact of a state Court of Appeals ruling handed down Thursday in a redistricting dispute.

And it could spell the end of the seven-year legal battle, since any continued fight would only affect legislative elections in 2010. After that, a new census is taken and new lines are drawn.

The court rejected an appeal from a coalition of Latinos and Democrats who claimed the map outlining Arizona s 30 legislative districts was drawn without consideration of the districts competitiveness. -- State s legislative-district boundaries to remain same

The court's opinion is on its website, Arizona Minority Coalition v. Arizona IRC, CA-CV 07-0301.

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The Hattiesburg American reports: A decision on whether Hattiesburg s City Council wards should be redrawn now rests with U.S. District Judge Keith Starrett.

The trial of a 2006 lawsuit against the city ended Wednesday with the city s attorneys not calling any witnesses.

Starrett did not provide a date for a decision but gave attorneys for both sides 30 days to submit written arguments. The plaintiffs attorney is Ellis Turnage; representing the city is Jerry Mills. ...

The group of black residents who filed the lawsuit want Starrett to eliminate college students from the mix and redistrict the city in accordance with 2006 data that suggest blacks would comprise at least 55 percent of the total voting age population when transient students are excluded.

The lawsuit says the City Council unfairly included more than 3,000 transient University of Southern Mississippi students in the equation used to draw Hattiesburg s 2002 redistricting plan.

They argue that including the students in the city s voting age population dilutes the strength of black voters. -- Hattiesburg American - www.hattiesburgamerican.com - Hattiesburg, Miss.

The complaint can be downloaded here.

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The Birmingham News reports: Gov. Bob Riley asked a panel of federal judges Tuesday to grant Jefferson County Commissioner George Bowman more time in office while other courts decide legal disputes over who fills county commission vacancies.

Cases are pending before the Alabama Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court over whether the new commissioner should be chosen by the governor or elected by voters.

Riley appointed Bowman in November to the District 1 seat on the Jefferson County Commission, after Larry Langford resigned to become Birmingham s mayor. -- Alabama Gov. Bob Riley asks for extension to keep Jefferson County Commission seat filled as courts rule- al.com

Note and disclosure: I am one of the counsel for the plaintiff in this case. Governor Riley's motion is here.

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The Tribune Star reports: The battle for Terre Haute City Hall continues with the latest shots coming from Mayor Duke Bennett’s legal team.

Lawyers for Bennett filed a new appeal with the Indiana Court of Appeals this week asking the court to overturn Vigo Circuit Court Judge David Bolk’s Dec. 21 ruling that Bennett was subject to the Hatch Act while he was running for mayor.

Former Mayor Kevin Burke, who lost the Nov. 6 election to Bennett by 110 votes, earlier had appealed another part of Bolk’s ruling. Burke appealed the part that allowed Bennett to take office because he was no longer in violation of the Hatch Act when he took office on Jan. 1. ...

Burke contended that Bennett should not have been eligible to run for mayor because he worked as director of operations at the Hamilton Center, a not-for-profit mental health organization that receives federal funding through its Head Start program. The Hatch Act is a federal law that limits the political activity of employees of some not-for-profits that receive federal money.

In December, Bolk ruled Bennett was indeed subject to the Hatch Act; however, Bolk also ruled that Bennett would no longer be in violation of the Act when he took office as mayor. As a result, Bennett took office as mayor. In his ruling, Bolk also noted other avenues had existed for challenging Bennett’s candidacy before Election Day. -- Bennett’s lawyers file new Hatch ruling appeal

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Harris News Service reports: Democratic and Republican negotiators clashed Wednesday over how strict to make legislation requiring most voters under age 65 to show photo identification to cast a ballot.

A conference committee of six lawmakers, three from each the House and Senate, have started discussing what elements to include in a compromise bill designed to pass both legislative chambers.

Each body has passed its own legislation enacting a photo ID requirement but the Senate s proposal is more stringent than the House-backed measure that passed last week.

The two Democrats on the panel, though, suggested that Gov. Kathleen Sebelius was likely to veto either measure. They urged Republican negotiators to proceed with what they say are less onerous ID requirements that have a better chance of becoming law. -- Hutchinson News Online

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The Des Moines Register reports: A Polk County District Court judge has ordered Iowa Secretary of State Michael Mauro to stop using languages other than English in the state’s official voter registration forms.

Judge Douglas Staskal ruled in favor of U.S. Rep. Steve King, an Iowa Republican, who sued state officials last year, contending they were violating the state’s English-language law. He brought the suit against Gov. Chet Culver, who previously served as secretary of state, and Mauro, contending they had placed illegal voting forms on the secretary of state’s Web site.

The dispute began shortly before Election Day in 2006, when King demanded that Culver remove voting information in languages other than English from the Web site. The site offered information in Spanish, Laotian, Bosnian and Vietnamese.

Non-English voter forms were removed from the the state's Web site late Thursday afternoon.

King, a former state senator, said the materials were illegal because under an English-language law authored by King and signed by Democratic Gov. Tom Vilsack in 2002, all official government communications must be in English. -- Judge: Iowa voting forms violate official English law | DesMoinesRegister.com | The Des Moines Register

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In Florida State Conference of the NAACP v. Browning, the 11th Circuit has reversed the injunction against Florida's voter registration law. Here is the opening paragraph of the decision:

This is an appeal of a preliminary injunction barring enforcement of a Florida voter registration statute as being preempted by two different federal statutes. The state law would require as a precondition of registering to vote for the first time in Florida that the voter disclose her driver’s license number or the last four digits of her Social Security number on the registration application, and that this number match up with the number for this voter contained in the state driver’s license database or the Social Security Administration’s database, respectively. The district court held that plaintiffs, several organizations representing the interests of minority communities in Florida, had standing to challenge the statute, would likely succeed at trial on the merits of their claim that federal law preempts the enforcement of the state law, and would suffer irreparable injury absent provisional relief. Accordingly, the court preliminarily enjoined the enforcement of the state statute. We affirm the district court’s decision on plaintiffs’ standing to prosecute this action and reverse its decision granting the preliminary injunction.

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The Birmingham News reports: A federal appellate court today ordered former Gov. Don Siegelman released from prison while he appeals his 2006 conviction, but denied co-defendant Richard Scrushy s request to be released.

Siegelman attorney Vince Kilborn said Siegelman would be released sometime Friday morning. His wife and his daughter, Dana, are driving out to get him, Kilborn said.

Scrushy attorney Art Leach said he had been told the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals denied Scrushy s request, but had no more details this evening.

Siegelman has been in an Oakdale, La., prison camp for nearly nine months. A federal jury in 2006 convicted Siegelman and Scrushy of federal funds bribery. Prosecutors alleged Scrushy bought a seat on a state board with a $500,000 donation to Siegelman s lottery campaign.

The judges wrote that Siegelman met both requirements for an appeal bond: He is not a flight risk and his appeal raises a substantial question of law or fact likely to result in reversal or an order for a new trial. -- Siegelman to be released from prison, Scrushy must stay in - Breaking News from The Birmingham News - al.com

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AP reports: Puerto Rico Gov. Anibal Acevedo Vila indignantly denied wrongdoing Thursday and gave no sign he would abandon his re-election effort after being charged with campaign finance violations that carry a penalty of 20 years in prison.

Acevedo, a superdelegate to this summer's Democratic convention, accused U.S. prosecutors of pursuing a politically motivated indictment alleging that the governor and a dozen other people conspired to illegally pay off his campaign debts. ...

Acevedo served in Washington as the island's nonvoting delegate to Congress then was elected governor in 2004 after campaigning on an anti-corruption platform. ...

In a brief address on Puerto Rican television Thursday evening, he repeated his denials and accused U.S. authorities of distracting him from trying to revive the island's struggling economy. "They want blood not your well being," he said of federal prosecutors. The governor did not take questions.

His indictment on 19 charges, including conspiracy to violate federal campaign laws, conspiracy to defraud the Internal Revenue Service and giving false testimony to the FBI, made him the latest U.S. governor to run into legal trouble. -- Feds charge P.Rico governor, 12 others - Yahoo! News

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AP reports: Supreme Court justices expressed skepticism Monday about the federal government s authority to block the governor of Alabama s appointment of a fellow Republican to a vacant county commission seat representing a mostly black and heavily Democratic district.

The case is over whether Gov. Bob Riley needed clearance from the Justice Department under the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which requires Alabama and several other states -- most of them in the South -- to get federal approval before changing election procedures that affect minority voters. ...

Local Democrats challenged the appointment, arguing that a special election should have been held as in the past and that Riley's decision amounted to just the kind of voting-rights change that requires Justice Department approval.

Last January, the Justice Department agreed and said Riley's appointment appeared to weaken minority voters. Later, a three-judge panel in U.S. District Court in Montgomery ruled that Riley's move was unlawful and vacated the appointment. -- High court questions federal authority over Alabama in governor s pick - Breaking News from The Birmingham News - al.com

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Here is the transcript of Monday's argument in 07-77.pdf , Riley v. Kennedy.

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Governor Riley has filed a long-winded notice of appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court from the Judgment in Plump v. Riley.

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CBS 13 in Sacramento reports: A man suspected of state voter registration fraud was arrested on Sac State's campus. Accused of signing up fake people to vote!

Why would there be a manhunt by the election fraud unit of the Secretary of State for this mystery guy, 45-year-old Don Cornell Williams.

He's known by state officials for registering voters in Southern California.

"That's what he does for a living," says Corey, a friend of the suspect. ...

Corey says some unknown organization pays Williams to get signatures. He says Williams told him gets cash for every signature or registered voter card he turns in. Yesterday the state election fraud unit got a tip Williams was at Sac State trying to register more people. They asked campus police to capture him on a warrant out of Orange County for completing voter registration cards using false names. -- cbs13.com - Man Arrested For State Voter Registration Fraud

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The Birmingham News reports: Three Jefferson County residents asked the Alabama Supreme Court Thursday to quickly overturn a Circuit Court judge's ruling that William Bell is entitled to be the District 1 county commissioner.

Lawyers for Patricia Working, Rick Erdemir and Floyd McGinnis filed a notice of appeal to the state's high court and recommended a March 28 deadline for written legal arguments.

They requested an expedited review of Judge Scott Vowell's ruling Tuesday against them and Gov. Bob Riley in a dispute over how to fill the commission seat held by Larry Langford before he resigned to become Birmingham's mayor. -- Jefferson County residents ask Alabama high court to quickly overturn county commissioner ruling- al.com

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The Birmingham News reports: William Bell is entitled to be the District 1 representative on the Jefferson County Commission, Circuit Court Judge Scott Vowell ruled Tuesday.

The case will next go to the Alabama Supreme Court. The state's high court must lift an injunction before county election officials can certify Bell as the winner of the Feb. 5 special election to replace Larry Langford.

Three county residents, only one of whom lived in District 1, challenged the election date in a suit filed Jan. 31. Albert Jordan, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said he would file an appeal today. ...

Vowell's decision Tuesday upheld a state law that allows special elections - in Jefferson County only - when an office is vacated. The judge also ruled that Gov. Bob Riley did not have authority to appoint George Bowman to the commission. ...

A spokeswoman for Riley said he also would appeal. -- Judge rules William Bell is District 1 representative on Jefferson County Commission; case goes to state Supreme Court- al.com

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Thomas Haymore, one the Stanford Law School students who did such great work on our brief, has written this summary of the case for ScotusWiki.

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The Birmingham News reports: Former Hale County Circuit Court Clerk Gay Nell Tinker has been indicted on multiple vote fraud-related charges.

A Hale County grand jury issued a 13-count indictment against Tinker after receiving evidence from the Attorney General s Office.

Investigators for years have been looking into voting irregularities in the west-central Black Belt county, and grand juries have indicted others on vote-fraud charges. ...

According to King's office, the indictment charges Tinker with nine counts of second-degree criminal possession of a forged instrument, an absentee voter affidavit; two counts of promoting illegal absentee voting by intentionally soliciting or otherwise promoting illegal absentee voting, and two counts of first-degree perjury by falsely certifying who signed an absentee voter affidavit. -- Former Hale County circuit clerk indicted- al.com

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The Union Leader reports: The U.S. Department of Justice is appealing the acquittal last month of former national Republican Party official James Tobin on telephone harassment charges stemming from the illegal GOP phone-jamming operation of Election Day, 2002.

U.S. District Court Judge Steven McAuliffe cleared Tobin, of Bangor, Maine, on Feb. 21, saying that he had been constrained by a 2007 appeals court ruling to conclude Tobin was entitled to acquittal. McAuliffe predicted then that the legal question at issue would eventually be addressed by the appellate court.

Federal prosecutors filed a notice of appeal this week.

The appeals court a year ago overturned Tobin s 2005 conviction on two felony telephone harassment charges stemming from the phone-jamming scheme and sent the case back to McAuliffe s trial court for review of whether Tobin s role had fit the crime with which he had been charged and convicted. Tobin was not required to serve any of his 10-month prison sentence. -- UnionLeader.com - New Hampshire news - Appeals court called in Tobin acquittal - Saturday, Mar. 15, 2008

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The National Law Journal reports: Third-party candidates take note for the upcoming presidential election: The First Amendment protects vote-swapping arrangements.

The short-circuited campaign in 2000 to arrange vote trading between supporters of presidential candidates Al Gore and Ralph Nader died when California election officials threatened the online sites with vote buying charges.

A federal appeals court back in December said California's action violated the free speech rights of people who wanted to swap votes. On Thursday the full court refused to back off that position, over the objection of three conservative judges, Porter v. Bowen, 06-55517.

Judge Andrew Kleinfeld of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals called the practice vote buying plain and simple, and thus illegal. But only two other judges joined his dissent from the full court's denial of en banc reconsideration March 13. It takes 14 votes to win reconsideration. -- Law.com - Vote-Swapping Arrangements Protected by First Amendment

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Gov. Riley has filed his reply brief in the U.S. Supreme Court case of Riley v. Kennedy. This is the Section 5 case that will be argued on 24 March.

Disclosure: I am one of the attorneys for Dr. Kennedy and the other plaintiffs in this action.

Posted by Ed at 1:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The New York Times reports: A lawsuit filed Thursday in a federal court in New York by Latino immigrants seeks to force immigration authorities to complete hundreds of thousands of stalled naturalization petitions in time for the new citizens to vote in November.

The class-action suit was brought by the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund on behalf of legal Hispanic immigrants in the New York City area who are eager to vote and have been waiting for years for the federal Citizenship and Immigration Services agency to finish their applications. The suit demands that the agency meet a nationwide deadline of Sept. 22 to complete any naturalization petitions filed by March 26.

Latino groups hope to summon the clout of the federal courts to compel the Bush administration to reduce a backlog of citizenship applications that swelled last year. According to the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan research group in Washington, more than one million citizenship petitions were backed up in the pipeline by the end of December, the majority from Latino immigrants.

Despite protests over the delays from lawmakers, Latino groups and immigrant advocates, the immigration agency is currently projecting wait times of 16 months to 18 months to process the petitions. -- Latinos Seek Citizenship in Time for Voting - New York Times

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The Rocky Mountain News reports: A Monday court ruling on Amendment 41, the controversial law that limits gifts to government workers, failed to clarify the measure and leaves the door wide open for more court challenges.

The state Supreme Court reinstated the gift ban and ordered a lower court to remove an injunction it issued in June.

But in its ruling, the court declined to comment on the larger issue of whether the gift ban is constitutional. ...

The state's high court said it's too early to challenge the state constitutional amendment, approved by voters in November 2006, because an ethics commission charged with enforcing the measure hasn't completely formed yet. ...

Amendment 41 was designed to reduce the influence of lobbyists and interest groups on government. It bans all gifts from lobbyists and limits other gifts and services to no more than $50 per year. Elected officials, state and certain local government workers and their children and spouses are subject to the law. In addition, elected officials cannot take lobbying jobs until two years after leaving office. -- Gift ban restored, but ruling leaves much unsettled : Updates : The Rocky Mountain News

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The New York Times reports: The rumors wash up against the gray walls of La Fortaleza, the governor’s palace in this city’s colonial quarter, with the regularity of the ocean’s waves. Every few weeks they seem to gather momentum, like a tidal surge, and threaten to overwhelm the place and its occupant, Gov. Aníbal S. Acevedo Vilá.

At one moment, the word on the street is that the governor will be arrested before the weekend. At the next, he will be spared, though several of his close associates will fall.

And so it has gone for more than two years while federal investigators have looked into accusations of campaign finance violations relating to Mr. Acevedo, a Democrat, who is up for re-election this year. ...

The federal authorities have refused to make any statements about the case; what is known publicly about the investigation has been gleaned through leaks and the scant information provided by witnesses who have testified before the grand jury. According to those witnesses, investigators have asked about the finances of Mr. Acevedo’s 2004 race for governor and about his successful campaign in 2000 to become the resident commissioner, Puerto Rico’s nonvoting delegate to Congress. (Mr. Acevedo has said that if there were improprieties in his campaigns, he was not aware of them.) -- Puerto Rico’s Political Melodrama Plays On, With Its Governor in the Lead Role

Posted by Ed at 5:26 PM |