Indiana Attorney General Curtis Hill is hitting back at Secretary of State Connie Lawson for calling his actions “reckless” but is remaining quiet on the assertion that his motion to derail Marion County’s plan to expand early voting is “premised on a fundamental factual misrepresentation.”
Opposition is rising to embattled Attorney General Curtis Hill’s move to block expanded early voting in Marion County, with Indiana Secretary of State Connie Lawson calling Hill’s action “reckless” and urging him to drop the matter. Under state law, Lawson’s office is responsible for election oversight, and she said Hill did not consult her before going to court.
Marion County’s decision to open additional voting centers is being contested by Attorney General Curtis Hill, but the Marion County Election Board disputes his assertion that the agreement to offer more early voting sites is contrary to Indiana law or that the board lacked a unanimous vote.
When presented with one of the most consequential cases of the 2017 term, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments, then heard more oral arguments before issuing an opinion in mid-June that essentially sidestepped the issue.
Marion County voters will be able to vote in one of six satellite voting locations in the 2018 general election, officials announced Wednesday in response to a federal court order. A consent decree entered earlier this month required the county to establish at least five early-voting locations.
When Indianapolis attorney Maurice Scott’s wife told him there were students at the Global Prep Academy who had questions about current government issues, he immediately volunteered to give some answers. Scott and three students travelled to Nashville, Tenn. on Thursday to participate in a national debate competition.
The Marion County Election Board has agreed to open five additional satellite locations for early in-person voting starting with the 2018 general election, settling a lawsuit brought in 2017 by Common Cause Indiana and the NAACP. Senior judge Sarah Evans Barker of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana signed on Tuesday a consent decree offered by the plaintiffs and defendants.
The next Supreme Court justice will join the bench at a time when the public has more confidence in the high court than in Congress or the presidency. A Gallup survey in June found 37 percent of Americans have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the court, while another 42 percent have “some” confidence. Only 18 percent have little or no confidence in the court.
The city of Anderson and its former Mayor Kevin Smith will pay $30,000 to a former city worker who filed a lawsuit alleging she was arrested for trying to deliver her mother’s absentee ballot. The city will pay $20,000, while Smith will pay $10,000 under a May settlement.
States can target people who haven’t cast ballots in a while in efforts to purge their voting rolls, the Supreme Court ruled Monday in a case that has drawn wide attention amid stark partisan divisions and the approach of the 2018 elections.
Three public advocacy groups have temporarily stopped the enforcement of Indiana’s 2017 voter registration law, which could potentially purge eligible voters from the rolls without providing them written notice. Judge Tanya Walton Pratt of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana granted a preliminary injunction prohibiting the state from implementing the 2017 version of Senate Enrolled Act 442.
A federal judge in Fort Wayne recently certified a class of Allen County Jail inmates who were denied the right to vote in the November 2016 general election. The attorney representing the class said the case represents an opportunity to avoid similar future problems in other counties.
In a decision handed down one day before Indiana’s 2018 primary election, the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals found a rational relationship between an Indiana statute prohibiting sex offenders from entering school property and the state’s interest in protecting children. The court ruled the state does not violate a convicted sex offender’s voting rights by prohibiting him from voting at a polling place located in a high school, and instead requiring him to vote via one of three alternatives.
A county clerk says Indiana election officers have directed poll workers not to allow anyone into voting stations with clothing sporting the phrase “Make America Great Again,” a slogan popularized by Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.
A federal judge Wednesday ordered Marion County to establish at least two early satellite voting precincts in time for the November general election, though the court refrained from requiring them in time for the May 8 primary election.
The Supreme Court of the United States has already heard a major case about political line-drawing that has the potential to reshape American politics. Now, before even deciding that one, the court is taking up another similar case.
The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in a key voting rights case necessitates the Department of Justice take corrective action before the 2020 census, an Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law professor testified.
Attorneys at Faegre Baker Daniels LLP are part of the legal team representing Michigan voters who filed a complaint in December over partisan gerrymandering. The suit brought to seven the number of such challenges filed since 2016 and fueled hope that the U.S. Supreme Court will rule the practice unconstitutional and offer guidance for how to draw district lines.
Voters in Marion County will have more options starting with the 2019 elections due to long-debated changes approved Wednesday that expand early voting and create vote centers in the county.
An Indiana Senate panel has advanced a bill what would set criteria for redrawing electoral districts. But the measure approved on an 8-0 vote Monday fell far short of a comprehensive redistricting overhaul that good government groups have sought for years.