The courts, for now, seem to be upholding election laws against the Malignant Fascist's and his rotted- out Republican/ MAGAt party's attempts to subvert American democracy. Decisions in several states in recent days offer glimmers of hope that the flame hasn't yet been extinguished.
A federal appeals court on Tuesday ruled that it is unconstitutional for the presidential battleground state of Pennsylvania to throw out mail-in ballots simply because the voter didn’t write an accurate date on the return envelope.
The unanimous decision by the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered Pennsylvania to stop throwing out such ballots and upheld the decision earlier this year by a federal judge in Pittsburgh.
In its 55-page opinion, the three-judge panel said it had to weigh the state’s interest in throwing out the ballots against the constitutional right to vote.
The panel wrote that it was “unable to justify” the practice of discarding such ballots “that has resulted in the disqualification of thousands of presumably proper ballots.”
Under [Republican- passed] Pennsylvania law, voters are required to write the date on the return envelope for their mail ballot. However, thousands of voters, confused by the request to write the date, might skip it or write another date, such as their birth date.
Tuesday’s decision marks the latest instance in more than a half-dozen cases where a court has instructed election officials in Pennsylvania to count such ballots.
However, higher courts have always reinstated the requirement in the heavily litigated matter that has pitted Democrats and their allies in trying to get rid of the requirement against Republicans who defend it. For Tuesday’s ruling to be reversed, the U.S. Supreme Court would need to take up the issue.
Asked whether they might appeal, the state and national Republican parties said in a joint statement that they were considering their next steps in the case.
Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania supported the lawsuit against the provision and, in a statement Tuesday, said it is “disenfranchisement and unconstitutional” to throw out a voter’s ballot over the handwritten date. His administration’s lawyers had argued that “meaningless errors shouldn’t cost you your right to vote in Pennsylvania,” he said.
A federal judge on Friday ordered Alabama lawmakers to draw new state Senate districts after ruling the state violated the Voting Rights Act by diluting the influence of Black voters around the capital city.
U.S. District Judge Anna Manasco blocked the state from using the current map in the 2026 elections and said a new map must be put in place that creates a new district in Montgomery where Black voters “comprise a voting-age majority or something quite close to it.”
“The appropriate remedy is a redistricting plan that includes either an additional majority-Black Senate district in the Montgomery area, or an additional district there in which Black voters otherwise have an opportunity to elect a senator of their choice,” Manasco wrote in the 261-page ruling.
The ruling said the court will redraw the districts if the state does not do so in time for the 2026 elections.
The order came from a 2021 lawsuit that argued the Alabama Senate district lines diluted the voting strength of Black citizens in Huntsville and Montgomery. The lawsuit maintained that in Montgomery, Black voters were unnecessarily packed into a single district, preventing them from influencing elections elsewhere, while white voters in the majority-Black city of Montgomery were “surgically” extracted into another district.
Manasco did not find a Voting Rights Act violation in Huntsville. However, she said that the evidence shows that another Black-majority district could be created in Montgomery...
The Utah Legislature will need to rapidly redraw the state’s congressional boundaries after a judge ruled Monday that the Republican-controlled body circumvented safeguards put in place by voters to ensure districts aren’t drawn to favor any party.
The current map, adopted in 2021, divides Salt Lake County — Utah’s population center and a Democratic stronghold — among the state’s four congressional districts, all of which have since elected Republicans by wide margins.
District Court Judge Dianna Gibson made few judgments on the content of the map but declared it unlawful because lawmakers had weakened and ignored an independent commission established by voters to prevent partisan gerrymandering.
“The nature of the violation lies in the Legislature’s refusal to respect the people’s exercise of their constitutional lawmaking power and to honor the people’s right to reform their government,” Gibson said in the ruling.
New maps will need to be drawn quickly, before candidates start filing in early January for the 2026 midterm elections. The ruling gives lawmakers a deadline of Sept. 24 and allows voting rights groups involved in the legal challenge to submit alternate proposals to the court.
But appeals expected from Republican officials could help them run out the clock to possibly delay adopting new maps until 2028...
District maps for seats in the Louisiana Legislature violate the federal Voting Rights Act, a panel of judges on the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled. Their decision upholds a lower court ruling that found the boundaries discriminated against Black voters.
The panel’s ruling was issued Thursday in the case Nairne v. Landry, in which Black voters sued the state over redistricting plans the legislature adopted in 2022. The new boundaries for Louisiana Senate and House of Representatives districts did not increase the number of majority Black seats. The plaintiffs alleged they were unconstitutional racial gerrymanders.
The three appellate judges – James Dennis, an appointee of President Bill Clinton; Catharina Haynes, an appointee of President George W. Bush; and Irma Ramirez, an appointee of President Joe Biden – upheld a 2024 ruling from U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick of the Middle District of Louisiana.
Dick, who former President Barack Obama named to the federal bench, determined the legislative maps do not give Black voters a fair opportunity to elect their own representatives. Dick’s ruling came after the 2023 elections, when a new class of lawmakers were elected, yielding a Republican supermajority in both chambers.
The state appealed Dick’s decision, arguing in part that Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act is unconstitutional and should not be applied to Louisiana. The section prohibits actions and policy that restrict a person’s right to vote based on their race, color or membership in a language minority group.
The 5th Circuit judges disagreed with that argument.
Their decision said that when Congress approved the Voting Rights Act, “it did so based on overwhelming evidence that ‘sterner and more elaborate measures were needed to address ‘an insidious and pervasive evil,” referring to laws in some states that sought to disenfranchise Black voters.
The judges shot down the state’s request that it ignore the Supreme Court and disregard the intent of Congress when it outlawed racial discrimination in voting in Section 2.
“This is a historic affirmation of the rights of Black voters in Louisiana,” said Megan Keenan, a staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union’s Voting Rights Project who is representing the Nairne plaintiffs. “Today’s decision sends a powerful message: The Voting Rights Act is still a vital safeguard against racial discrimination in our democracy.” ...
If these decisions are appealed, counting on the Republican Supreme Court (which has already eviscerated the Voting Rights Act to help tip the scales for the MAGAt Republican Party) to uphold the lower court decisions may require a lot of wishful thinking. The other game at play is simply running out the clock for the 2026 elections through legal maneuvering and delays. Both of these anti- democratic tactics are right in the Republican wheelhouse. You also have, in the Malignant Fascist, someone who fantasizes being a dictator and who's proclaimed, " I can do anything I want."
But for now, check.
(Image: via aclu.org)
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