Marisa Wright is a US National Correspondent for JURIST, and a 2L at Harvard Law School. On Wednesday, December 7, the US Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in a case involving a fringe legal idea called the independent state legislature theory that poses a threat to the current system of election administration in the [...]
Search Results for: absentee
Georgia Supreme Court declines to hear challenge to early voting in runoff election
The Supreme Court of Georgia denied Republicans’ attempt to prevent advance voting in the Georgia Senate run-off election. The decision comes after the Georgia Republican Party, the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) and the Republican National Committee (RNC) filed an emergency petition and motion to stay with the state’s highest court. The Georgia Republican Party, [...]
Voters across Nevada, Connecticut, Michigan, Arizona, Nebraska and Ohio Tuesday voted on whether to expand or restrict voter access to election procedures. Some of the issues addressed in the proposed ballot initiatives and constitutional amendments paralleled issues in the over 100 lawsuits filed leading up to Election Day. In Nevada, with approximately 77 percent of [...]
Over 100 election-related lawsuits filed ahead of US Election Day
Ahead of the US Election Day on November 8, Republicans and Democrats filed over 100 election-related lawsuits, according to Democracy Docket, a progressive voting rights organization. 138 lawsuits were filed across the US as of Tuesday. Even as Election Day got underway, additional cases extending polling hours were filed and decided in Georgia and Pennsylvania. [...]
Georgia extends mail-in voting deadline for voters who did not receive absentee ballots
A court in Cobb County, Georgia, issued an order Monday to accommodate voters who requested absentee ballots that were never sent. An administrative error at the Cobb County Board of Elections (BOE) left 1,036 voters without their requested absentee ballots as election day quickly approached. The consent order, issued the day before election day, required [...]
PA Supreme Court orders counties to refrain from counting incorrectly dated mail-in ballots
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court Tuesday ordered Pennsylvania county boards of elections to refrain from counting, segregate and preserve any mail-in ballots contained in undated or incorrectly dated envelopes. The court is split on whether failing to count these votes would violate the Materiality Provision of the Civil Rights Act. The Materiality Provision prohibits disenfranchising voters [...]
US federal judge orders Senator Lindsay Graham to testify before special Georgia grand jury
A US federal judge Monday told US Senator Lindsay Graham that he must testify before a Fulton County, Georgia, grand jury about efforts to overturn the 2020 US presidential election in that state. District Attorney Fani Willis seeks to question Graham surrounding two telephone calls that Graham made to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger [...]
Massachusetts court rules in favor of mail-in voting, early voting law
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Monday ruled that no-excuse mail-in voting and early voting are permissable under the state’s constitution. After Massachusett Governor Charlie Baker signed the VOTES Act in June, the law faced legal challenges from Massachusetts Republicans. On Monday, the court declined to grant an injunction blocking the law’s implementation. The new law makes [...]
Wisconsin high court holds using ballot drop boxes illegal under state statutes
The Wisconsin Supreme Court has held that using ballot drop boxes is illegal under state statutes. According to the court’s majority opinion, issued Friday, absentee ballots must be returned by mail or personally delivered to the municipal clerk. There are exceptions for voters who are disabled or require assistance in submitting their ballots. However, if not [...]
A Pennsylvania intermediate appellate court has ordered the state’s election officials to track US Senate primary race mail-in ballots without dated envelopes. The mail-in ballot counting lawsuit was filed by the campaign of David McCormick, asking Pennsylvania to count ballots even if they lacked the required handwritten date on the external envelope. McCormick and Dr. Mehmet [...]