partisanship

Partisan Battles Loom Large over Pennsylvania’s Election Audit

Election Law Society · February 21, 2022 ·

By: Christopher Chau

Following the contentious 2020 election, controversy surrounded the validity of Pennsylvania’s election process as voters requested and submitted record numbers of mail-in ballots. While no-excuse mail-in voting was legalized under Act 77 in 2019, Republicans in the Pennsylvania Senate quickly turned against the practice and claimed that it was vulnerable to voter fraud. On September 3, 2021, the Republican majority announced a “full forensic investigation,” in what seems to be an audit of the election results, voting to subpoena the PA Department of State for voter records along with nonpublic personal identification information, such as Social Security and driver’s license numbers. According to Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman: “This is about looking at our system inside because hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Pennsylvanians, have questions.” While Corman asserted that voters’ information will be kept private, many remained concerned about the invasiveness of the audit. Meanwhile, Senate Democrats and PA Attorney General Josh Shapiro criticized the measure, citing that there was no evidence of voter fraud and that the investigation was a waste of taxpayer money and an invasion of voters’ privacy.

Primaries and Parties: Fusion Confusion?

Election Law Society · February 4, 2019 ·

By: Jonathan Barsky

This is the second of two posts raising potential constitutional flaws in California’s recently adopted “Top Two” primary system. This system allows the two candidates who receive the most votes, regardless of party affiliation, to advance to the general election in a wide array of state and federal races. This post will analyze a First Amendment objection rooted in the associational rights of political parties.

Nonpartisan Blanket Primary in Oregon

Election Law Society · April 18, 2016 ·

By: Matthew Hubbard

In 2014, Oregonians voted on Ballot Measure 90, which aimed to overhaul the state’s primary election system by establishing a nonpartisan blanket primary. A form of open primary, a nonpartisan blanket primary system requires all candidates for a political office to participate in a single primary. The top two vote getters from this primary advance to the general election, regardless of their stated party affiliation.

Abysmal Voter Turnout and an Electoral Dinosaur: Indiana’s Meaningless Off-Year Municipal Elections

Election Law Society · March 28, 2016 ·

By: Jacob Kipp

All politics is local. That truism (often wrongly attributed to former Rep. Tip O’Neill) has long encouraged politicians to remember the people back home because, ultimately, those people will vote based on the issues that matter to them. But politics is looking a lot less local now. Local concerns have taken a backseat to partisan politics, and local candidates are looking more and more like extensions of their national counterparts. Perhaps these changes can help explain why municipal election voter turnout is plunging across the United States. Indiana, the state with the lowest voter turnout in the country for the 2014 midterm elections, held its most recent off-year municipal elections on November 3.

Conflicted Court Likely to Reverse 4th Circuit in Maryland Redistricting Case

Election Law Society · March 2, 2016 ·

By: Hayley Steffen

The stakes were high at oral argument for Shapiro v. McManus on November 4, 2015. Justice Breyer said Shapiro and his co-plaintiffs “want[ed] to raise about as important a question as you can imagine . . . And if they [were] right, that would affect congressional districts and legislative districts throughout the nation.” It was clear that the justices struggled with the serious implications that their decision could have for future redistricting and partisan gerrymandering cases.