Texas: Justice Department review delays Texas Voter ID law | Your Houston News

The U.S. Department of Justice is reviewing Texas’ recently passed Voter ID bill after a ruling Dec. 23 stated that a similar bill in South Carolina did not meet requirements of the 1965 Voter Rights Act and made it more difficult for minorities to vote. “I’m disappointed the Department of Justice is playing politics in this,” State Rep. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, said. “I’m intrigued to see the outcome of the litigation, but at the end of the day, the Supreme Court is going to uphold it.”

Creighton said the bill would require voters to provide a Texas Driver’s License or Department of Public Safety public identification card, citizenship papers or a U.S. passport, or similar documents. For those who do not have the required document, Creighton said a DPS identification card can be obtained free of charge.

Virginia: Attorney General changes mind, won’t intervene in primary ballot case | The Washington Post

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) announced Sunday that he has reconsidered his decision from Saturday and will not seek to get several GOP presidential candidates added to the state’s primary ballot. Every candidate except Mitt Romney and Ron Paul failed to meet the stringent requirements to get on the ballot for the state’s March 6 primary, and Cuccinelli said Saturday that he would seek to get them added to the ballot.

But in a statement Sunday, he reversed course and said he would seek a change in the requirements for future elections only. In the end, Cuccinelli said trying to make immediate changes wouldn’t be fair to the Romney and Paul campaigns.

Virginia: Four GOP candidates join Perry’s lawsuit challenging Virginia ballot access | The Hill

Four additional GOP presidential candidates joined Rick Perry’s federal court challenge to Virginia’s ballot-access rules this weekend, in a show of force by five rivals for the Republican nomination who otherwise will not appear on the state’s primary ballot. Michele Bachmann, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum, Jon Huntsman, and Perry all failed to qualify for Virginia’s primary ballot because their campaigns did not collect enough signatures.

Texas Gov. Perry first filed a federal court challenge to Virginia’s ballot-access rules on Tuesday. Attorneys representing the additional candidates sent a letter to the chairman of Virginia’s Republican party on Saturday. The letter asks that the candidates’ names be added to the ballot, an action that would moot their constitutional challenge to the current law. The state requires candidates to obtain 10,000 signatures from registered voters in the state, including at least 400 from each of 11 congressional districts.

Virginia: Republican candidates may get another shot at Virginia ballot for Super Tuesday | The Washington Post

 

The slate of Republican presidential hopefuls who did not qualify for the Virginia primary might get another shot. Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli II plans to file emergency legislation to re-open the process to GOP candidates. Virginia’s process has come under fire since it was announced last week that only former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and Rep. Ron Paul (Tex.) had qualified for the ballot.“Recent events have underscored that our system is deficient,” Cuccinelli (R) said in a statement Saturday. “Virginia owes her citizens a better process. We can do it in time for the March primary if we resolve to do so quickly.”

 

Neither Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Rep. Michelle Bachmann, former senator Rick Santorum nor former House speaker Newt Gingrich submitted the 10,000 signatures required to get a spot on the state’s ballot in time for Super Tuesday. According to news reports, Cuccinelli’s plan would allow candidates who qualify for federal matching funds to go onto the state’s ballot. Perry’s campaign filed a lawsuitmaintaining that he was unable to submit the required signatures because of the state’s “requirement that all petition circulators be an eligible or registered qualified voter in Virginia.”

Editorials: Review & Outlook: Holder’s Racial Politics | WSJ.com

Eric Holder must be amazed that President Obama was elected and he could become Attorney General. That’s a fair inference after the Attorney General last Friday blocked South Carolina’s voter ID law on grounds that it would hurt minorities. What a political abuse of law.

In a letter to South Carolina’s government, Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Thomas Perez called the state law—which would require voters to present one of five forms of photo ID at the polls—a violation of Section 5 of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Overall, he noted, 8.4% of the state’s registered white voters lack photo ID, compared to 10% of nonwhite voters. This is the yawning chasm the Justice Department is now using to justify the unprecedented federal intrusion into state election law, and the first denial of a “pre-clearance” Voting Rights request since 1994.

Congo: DRC Opposition Figure Blames MONUSCO for Election Debacle | VoA News

A top adviser for veteran opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi says the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is to blame for the “fraudulent” November elections. Albert Moleka, the cabinet director of the Union for Democracy and Social Progress party and spokesman for Mr. Tshisekedi, said the UN mission failed in its mandate to help Congo’s electoral commission administer a credible vote during the November elections.

“We found out that all these election figures were all made up with the complicity of the MONUSCO because it was part of the commission that validated the results,” said Moleka. “It’s a serious matter because MONUSCO was supposed to [bolster] security for the Congolese people and also to help us through the electoral process.”

The Voting News Weekly: TVN Weekly December 26 2011 – January 1 2012

As we open a new year, Fareed Zakaria noted the many significant elections scheduled across the world in the coming year. Hackers have threatened to disrupt this week’s Iowa Caucuses. Rick Perry files a lawsuit after he failed to submit sufficient signatures to meet ballot access requirements for the Virginia primary. The Montana Supreme Court upheld the State’s ban on corporation spending on political campaigns, while the Indiana Supreme Court upheld a ban on robo-calls. The New York Times surveyed laws passed in 2011 that could make it difficult for students to vote. Jeffrey Toobin consider Attorney General Eric Holder’s legacy after the Department of Justice blocked South Carolina’s Voter ID law and Joshua Spivak considered the causes for the many recall elections over the past year.