The Florida Supreme Court has posted their docket for the 2012 Florida Senate Redistricting case. The Leon County Clerk of the Court has also posted documents from the challenges to the state’s redistricting process for congressional seats. As reported by the AP (via News-Press), hearings will be held this week on both topics.
An update for you on the election litigation related to HB1355 that is ongoing in the State of Florida. The Orlando Sentintel reports that the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia (where the State filed its request for preclearance of sections of HB1355 under the Federal Voting Rights Act) views it unlikely...
Coverage on yesterday’s hearing from the Tallhassee Democrat, Miami Herald/AP, and Palm Beach Post.
The litigation related to last year’s changes to Florida’s election laws continues, here are some status updates from Politico and from a website associated with the Plaintiffs in the case: Brennan Center Many of the filings in the case are also available online at ther Mortiz College of Law site. And if you need...
Two updates this week related to past stories on this blog. As explained in the Palm Beach Post, the ACLU and League of Woman Voters challenge to the implementation of HB1355 was dismissed as moot and for a lack of standing and ripeness. The District Court found that most of the law had been precleared...
A surprising development in the preclearance saga of HB1355, the State has filed a First Amended Complaint seeking to have the court declare the preclearance obligation in Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act unconstitutional. To recap my past posts on this topic: under the Federal Voting Rights Act, the State of Florida has to...
Interesting story out of the Florida Keys today related to local Supervisors of Elections getting involved in the Voting Rights Act litigation involving HB1355. The memorandum in support of the motion to intervene that includes the Supervisors, the ACLU, and Project Vote is also online.
Here’s the quote from the Secretary of State’s news release: “The purpose of filing in the federal district court is to ensure that the changes to Florida’s election law are judged on their merits by eliminating the risk of a ruling impacted by outside influence,… ince the passage of HB 1355, we have seen...
The St. Pete Times is reporting on a protest yesterday in Tampa related to HB1355. Meanwhile, the AP & Miami Herald are reporting on a hearing today related to a libertarian group challenging Florida’s political committee regulatory structure. The plaintiffs’ counsel has a summary of their suit on their website. It appears to be one...
A 5-4 decision of the United States Supreme Court in Arizona Free Enterprise Club’s Freedom Club PAC et al. V. Bennett, Secretary of State of Arizona, et al. holding that Arizona’s matching funds law substantially burdened political speech and was not sufficiently justified by a compelling interest to survive First Amendment scrutiny quickly impacted Florida...