National: Trump Adds Clinton Impeachment Lawyer, Bracing for a Fight on Multiple Fronts | The New York Times

President Trump hired on Wednesday a Washington lawyer who represented Bill Clinton during his impeachment, a sign that the White House sees no immediate end to its legal problems and is girding for a combative relationship with a new Congress after the midterm elections. The new lawyer, Emmet T. Flood, will replace Ty Cobb, the White House lawyer who persuaded Mr. Trump to cooperate with the special counsel for the first year of its investigation. Mr. Cobb assured the president that doing so would bring the investigation to a swift end.

National: Giuliani: Trump fired Comey because he wouldn’t tell Trump he wasn’t target in Russia probe | The Hill

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) said Wednesday that President Trump fired former FBI Director James Comey because Comey wouldn’t tell Trump that he wasn’t a target of the FBI investigation into Russia’s election interference. “He fired Comey because Comey would not, among other things, say that he wasn’t a target of the investigation,” Giuliani, who recently joined Trump’s legal team, told Fox News’s Sean Hannity. “He’s entitled to that. Hillary Clinton got that and he couldn’t get that,” Giuliani said. “So he fired him and he said, ‘I’m free of this guy.’ ” Giuliani’s statement contradicts Trump’s recent claim that he didn’t fire Comey over the Russia probe.

National: Cambridge Analytica and British parent shut down after Facebook scandal | Reuters

Cambridge Analytica, the firm embroiled in a controversy over its handling of Facebook Inc user data, and its British parent SCL Elections Ltd, are shutting down immediately after suffering a sharp drop in business, the company said on Wednesday. The company will begin bankruptcy proceedings, it said, after losing clients and facing mounting legal fees resulting from the scandal over reports the company harvested personal data about millions of Facebook users beginning in 2014. “The siege of media coverage has driven away virtually all of the Company’s customers and suppliers,” the statement said. “As a result, it has been determined that it is no longer viable to continue operating the business, which left Cambridge Analytica with no realistic alternative to placing the company into administration.”

Editorials: Rudy Giuliani may have just implicated President Trump in serious campaign finance violations. | Richard Hasen/Slate

Donald Trump’s new lawyer Rudy Giuliani took to Sean Hannity’s Fox News program Wednesday night to defend the president from the ongoing Mueller investigation and to calm the waters for the Trump faithful. But it looks like he’s gotten the president into potentially greater legal jeopardy by admitting that Trump repaid his fixer Michael Cohen for the $130,000 payment to adult film performer Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet, seemingly contradicting the president and potentially implicating Trump and his campaign in some serious campaign finance violations. Just to review where we are so far. It is undisputed that Trump’s sometimes-attorney and fixer Michael Cohen negotiated an agreement with Daniels shortly before the 2016 election to get her not to discuss an alleged sexual encounter with Trump in exchange for $130,000. Cohen eventually said that he paid that money out of his own pocket, and he secured a loan to do so. He said that neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign reimbursed him (he did not say that he was not reimbursed at all, leaving open the possibility of a Trump reimbursement). The president told reporters he had known nothing about the payment.

Arkansas: State Supreme Court says state can enforce voter ID law | Associated Press

Arkansas’ highest court on Wednesday said the state can enforce a voter ID law in the May 22 primary election despite a judge declaring the measure unconstitutional. By a vote of 6-1 the Supreme Court put on hold a Pulaski County judge’s decision blocking the law’s enforcement. Early voting for the primary begins Monday. The state Supreme Court did not elaborate on its reasons for the decision in its one-page order. Pulaski County Circuit Judge Alice Gray last week ruled the law was an unconstitutional effort to reinstate a 2013 voter ID law. That 2013 measure was struck down by the state Supreme Court in 2014. “We now have clear direction from the Court that the law we have been operating under since last August remains in effect for the Primary Election, until further orders from the Supreme Court,” said Chris Powell, a spokesman for Secretary of State Mark Martin, who had requested the ruling.

California: Voter fraud conviction inspires bill loosening oversight of lawmaker residency | The Sacramento Bee

Four years ago, Rod Wright resigned from the California Senate and served 71 minutes in jail after being convicted of eight felonies, including perjury and voter fraud, for living outside the district where he ran for office. Wright argued that he had done everything necessary to establish as his legal “domicile” an Inglewood home that he owned and where he registered to vote. But using photos of another house in the upscale neighborhood of Baldwin Hills, with his Maserati parked in front and closets full of his clothes, Los Angeles County prosecutors convinced a jury that Wright actually lived several miles away. The conviction upset many of Wright’s colleagues, who point out that the definition of a “domicile,” which establishes the eligibility of someone to run for a particular legislative seat, does not include the word “live” anywhere in it: “that place in which his or her habitation is fixed, wherein the person has the intention of remaining, and to which, whenever he or she is absent, the person has the intention of returning.”

Delaware: Bill introduced to allow for Same Day Registration | WMDT

A new house bill introduced Wednesday in Dover would make it possible to register to vote on Election Day, making The First State the 19th in the union to adopt Same Day Registration. Under HB 400, a person could register to vote at his or her polling place on the day of a presidential, state primary, general or special election. All they would have to do is show a valid government issued photo ID, a current utility bill, a bank statement or other government document that displays name and current address.

Guam: Automatic voter registration discussed | The Guam Daily

Additional costs and other factors such as the implementation of the Real ID requirement in June could affect the implementation of the automatic voter registration process proposed in Bill 234-34. The concerns were expressed by Guam Election Commission Executive Director Maria Pangelinan, who testified during Wednesday’s public hearing on the legislation. Bill 234 proposes to implement automatic voter registration for eligible U.S. citizen residents of Guam.

Indiana: Federal Judge Hears Case On Voter List Maintenance Law | NPR

Voter advocacy groups say an Indiana law will illegally throw Hoosiers off the voting rolls. And they’re suing to stop the state from using that law. A federal court hearing Wednesday centered on Indiana’s use of what’s known as the Interstate Crosscheck system. The Crosscheck system, which is run by the Kansas Secretary of State, looks for voters who seem to be registered in two different states. If it finds apparent matches, those matches get sent to participating states, including Indiana. The state then does its own check, and if enough voter info lines up, it’s forwarded to individual counties.

Pennsylvania: New University of Pittsburgh commission to focus on 2020 election security | Pittsburgh Tribune

A newly formed commission convened to study Pennsylvania’s election cyber­security aims to reduce vulnerability of the state’s polls in time for the next presidential contest. David Hickton, a former U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania and the head of University of Pittsburgh’s Institute for Cyber Law, Policy and Security, and Grove City College President Paul McNulty will lead the Blue Ribbon Commission on Pennsylvania’s Election Security. “Every part of our government and every part of what we stand for is premised upon free and fair elections and the public’s belief and confidence in our electoral system,” Hickton said. “Our systems are vulnerable.” Hickton said there is a sense of urgency in the commission’s work. He said he hopes the commission will wrap up later this year and present its recommendations to policymakers in time to have changes in place for 2020.

New Hampshire: Senate approves second voter residency bill of session; Sununu support uncertain | Concord Monitor

The New Hampshire Senate approved the second bill of the session intended to equate voting in the state with residency, acting on party-lines despite lingering uncertainty over the governor’s support. House Bill 1264, which passed, 14-10, is near-exact replica of an earlier bill, House Bill 372, dealing with the definition of residency. Both bills would merge the meaning of the words “domiciled” person and “resident” for the purposes of election law, effectively turning those who vote into de facto residents. Republican supporters have said that the bills would bring New Hampshire in line with all other states, which require residency in order to vote. Democrats have fiercely opposed the move, saying it would target college students who for years have been regarded “domiciled” in New Hampshire and allowed to vote here, but are not fully residents. Merging the definitions could require college students and other temporary workers to register their vehicles in the state after voting, a change critics have labeled a “poll tax.”

Tennessee: Knox County officials investigating election night cyberattack | USA Today

Officials are investigating a cyberattack that crashed the website displaying Knox County election results Tuesday night. Additionally, Knox County Mayor Tim Burchett on Wednesday said he has called for a cyber-security contractor to look into the server crash that shut down the county’s website just as polls closed on election night, according to a news release. … Sword & Shield Enterprise Security, a Knox County-based IT security firm, will conduct a root-cause analysis to determine the exact nature of the County server’s shut down, beginning today, the release said. IT Director Richard “Dick” Moran wrote that a preliminary review “noted that extremely heavy and abnormal network traffic was originating from numerous IP addresses associated with numerous geographic locations, both internal and external to this country. Based on my experience, this was highly suggestive of a (denial of service) attack.

Armenia: Further Unrest Risked After Protest Leader Is Rejected as Prime Minister | Bloomberg

Armenian opposition leader Nikol Pashinyan failed in his attempt to become prime minister after the ruling Republican party refused to back his candidacy despite massive street demonstrations backing him. Pashinyan, who’s termed the protest movement a “velvet revolution,” gained 45 votes, eight short of the majority he needed to become premier in place of Armenia’s longtime ruler, Serzh Sargysan, who resigned last week as tens of thousands joined opposition demonstrations. The result means parliament will vote again in a week. A repeat of the result would trigger early elections. In the meantime, further civil unrest is likely.

Editorials: Democracy Is Held Back in Armenia | Viken Berberian/The New York Times

On Tuesday, electoral arithmetic defeated democratic sentiment in Armenia after the Republican Party of Armenia, the majority party, used its numerical strength to back a discredited government and block the election of the opposition leader Nikol Pashinyan as the new prime minister. A chorus of defiant honks expressing the collective angst filled the streets of Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, as the disappointing result became public. Tens of thousands of people had been singing and chanting at the Republic Square near Parliament throughout the day in support of Mr. Pashinyan’s election. Mr. Pashinyan, a former crusading journalist and opposition leader, had led the massive protests against the government in April, which culminated in the resignation of the former president and prime minister, Serzh Sargsyan.

Ireland: Why has the Government done nothing to facilitate emigrant voting? | The Irish Times

Tens of thousands of recent Irish emigrants could potentially legally vote during the referendum on the Eighth Amendment on Friday, May 25th. But, in an ironic turn of events, our voting system will only accommodate those with the means to travel. As founders of the We’re Coming Back and Get the Boat to Vote campaigns, we were both involved in organising the #Hometovote movement for the Marriage Equality referendum in 2015. Despite the public outpouring of support, and the welcome back for those who “voted with their feet” as Enda Kenny put it, absolutely nothing has been done since to facilitate an emigrant vote. Why? Under our electoral laws, Irish emigrants may fully retain their voting rights at home for a period of 18 months after leaving. Although the vast majority of citizens overseas have been out of the country for longer than a year and a half, those who have recently left – most of them too young to have voted in the 1983 referendum that brought in the Eighth Amendment, or even been alive to see it enacted – may yet have their say on May 25th.

Pakistan: Could Facebook Data Leaks Impact Pakistan’s Elections? | The Diplomat

The surfacing in March of Cambridge Analytica’s social media breaches, with a whistleblower claiming that that over 50 million Facebook profiles were used to manipulate polls including the 2016 U.S. elections, meant that similar concerns have shrouded upcoming elections elsewhere this year. Among these are the general elections in Pakistan, scheduled to be held this summer. On April 6, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced two steps that would be introduced to address these apprehensions. “From now on, every advertiser who wants to run political or issue ads will need to be verified. To get verified, advertisers will need to confirm their identity and location,” he wrote on Facebook. “Second, we will also require people who manage large pages to be verified as well. This will make it much harder for people to run pages using fake accounts, or to grow virally and spread misinformation or divisive content that way.”

Turkey: Opposition parties unite against Erdoğan in elections | The Guardian

Turkey’s main opposition parties are expected to announce a broad electoral alliance before general elections in June, a step that could pose a significant challenge to the dominance of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling party. The deal, which will include the country’s largest secular and nationalist opposition blocs, is likely to dilute the Justice and Development party’s (AKP) control of the legislature and overcome the regulation that any party must receive 10% of the national vote to win a seat in parliament, a rule that has reinforced Erdoğan’s long-running majority. The coalition is expected to be formally announced on Thursday and will include the Republican People’s party (CHP), the İyi (Good) party, the Islamist Saadet party (SP) and the Democrat party (DP). The secularist CHP is the largest opposition grouping in parliament, and the newly formed İyi is composed primarily of nationalists. The İyi leader, Meral Akşener, has declared herself a presidential candidate.