Pennsylvania: Bill calls for redistricting reform | WHTM

A Pennsylvania lawmaker is proposing legislation to set new rules for mapping the state’s congressional and legislative districts. Under House Bill 1344, Pennsylvania citizens – not politicians – would be responsible for drawing the boundaries that equally divide the state’s population during the apportionment that follows each 10-year census.

South Dakota: ACLU files federal suit challenging election law change | Associated Press

Two small political parties in South Dakota filed a federal lawsuit Monday challenging part of a law that they say would make it harder to get their candidates on the ballot. The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit on behalf of the state’s Libertarian and Constitution parties, among other individuals. South Dakota activists are also gathering signatures to refer the law to voters in the 2016 election for a possible repeal. The measure in question, part of a new bundle of election law changes passed during the 2015 legislative session, shifted the deadline back by about a month for new parties to turn in signatures allowing them to participate in a primary election.

Washington: Despite pleas, Yakima council stands by appeal of ACLU case | Yakima Herald

More than 100 people filed into the Yakima City Council chambers Tuesday, calling for an end to the city’s appeal of a voting rights case that changed Yakima’s elections system to give Latinos a greater voice. But none of the four council members who supported both the appeal and a request to stay this year’s elections offered a motion to reconsider the issue. The protest was in response to the council’s surprise vote June 2 to seek an emergency stay more than a month and a half after the city said it would allow elections to proceed, despite appealing the judge’s ruling to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court.

Burundi: African Union Calls for Further Postponement of Burundi Election | Gbooza

The African Union has called for a postponement of Burundi’s July 15 presidential election, saying a new date should be decided through negotiations between the government and opposition. Erastus Mwencha, deputy chairperson of the African Union commission, said the proposed date is based on information the AU gathered through consultation with all stakeholders, including a report from leaders of the East African community. The election date, originally June 26, was changed by presidential decree following an electoral commission proposal. Violent protests in Burundi have taken place since President Pierre Nkurunziza’s decision to run for a third term, a move the president’s critics say would violate a two-term limit in the constitution. Nkurunziza’s supporters argue he is eligible to run again because he was appointed by lawmakers to his first term in office, and not elected by a popular vote.

Denmark: Denmark to vote in close election | BBC

Denmark goes to the polls on Thursday in a general election which opinion polls suggest is on a knife edge. The centre-left coalition of PM Helle Thorning-Schmidt, and the centre-right opposition led by ex-PM Lars Lokke Rasmussen, appear to be neck and neck. But the pollsters have only canvassed the Danish mainland – and voters in Greenland and the Faroe Islands may decide the vote. Minor issues like a Faroes fishing dispute could influence the result. The islands’ fishing community is still angry at Ms Thorning-Schmidt for barring its boats from Danish ports in a 2013 dispute over alleged overfishing.

Editorials: Why Russia Has Early Elections | The Moscow Times

In what has become a common political tactic in modern Russia, the next round of State Duma elections may be moved up to an earlier date than originally planned. On Monday, a bill proposing that the elections to Russia’s lower house of parliament scheduled for December 2016 be pushed forward to September was submitted for consideration. Russian parliamentary elections have been held in December since 1993. However, Duma speaker Sergei Naryshkin recently said that lawmakers should now be elected before budgets are passed later in the fall. Some commentators have noted that the new timing would place campaigning in the middle of the Russian vacation season. Others have suggested that incumbent legislators may favor earlier elections to stay ahead of rising discontent over the recent economic downturn in Russia.

Uganda: Electoral Body Warns Against Early Campaigning | VoA News

Uganda’s Electoral Commission is warning all political parties and civil society groups that they would be flouting the country’s laws if they engage in early political campaigns before an official declaration. “We released a road map clearly ahead of the elections, [and] we indicated activities and their time frame,” said Jotham Taremwa, commission spokesman. Because nominations have not yet been made, “whoever is posing as a candidate is out of order.”

National: The fight to strengthen Voting Rights Act is not over yet | Zachary Roth/MSNBC

Legislation to strengthen the Voting Rights Act (VRA) remains stalled in the Republican-controlled Congress. But as the two-year anniversary of the Supreme Court decision that gutted the landmark civil rights law approaches, supporters of the measure aren’t giving up the fight, despite long odds. A coalition of civil rights, voting rights, labor, and other progressive groups plan to mark the June 25 anniversary by rallying in the Virginia district of Rep. Bob Goodlatte, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee where the legislation has been bottled up. “In this 50th anniversary year of the Voting Rights Act, voters are more vulnerable to discrimination than at any time since the law was first passed in 1965,” Wade Henderson, the president of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, said in a statement. “Congressional leadership has yet to act on restoring the law.”

National: As Hillary Clinton Pitches Voting Rights On The Trail, Her Counsel Looks To Fight For Them In Court | Huffington Post

The general counsel for Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign is heading up three high-profile lawsuits against Republican-backed voting restrictions in what is shaping up to be a perfect political and legal storm leading up to the 2016 election. The attorney, Marc Elias, is involved in lawsuits challenging measures passed in Ohio, Virginia and Wisconsin, arguing that laws cutting back early voting, restricting registration and requiring photo identification to vote, among other measures, disproportionately impact racial minorities.

Editorials: Bruce Schneier movie-plot threat contest: Winning entry imagines online voting gone wrong. | Slate

Imagine this: It’s the morning of Election Day, 2020. Americans across the country cast secure, encrypted votes from their smartphones and laptops, electronically choosing their president for the first time in history. Turnout reaches record highs. Live results online show that it’s a close race between the two leading candidates. But by early afternoon, an independent candidate—a sketchy figure with ties to multiple terrorist organizations and no public support whatsoever—mysteriously takes the lead. At 4 p.m., he officially wins the election. The American people rise up in protest: Clearly, hacking, bribery, or other nefarious activity has taken place. However, because the voting software is designed with end-to-end encryption to ensure anonymity, no audit or recount is possible. America’s next president is a terrorist. This is the hypothetical scenario that won Bruce Schneier’s annual online “movie-plot threat” contest by popular vote this past weekend.

Maine: Support erodes in Legislature to change how questions get on ballot | Portland Press Herald

A bill that will make it more difficult for citizens to initiate new ballot questions advanced in the Legislature on Monday, but it’s losing support amid warnings from opponents that the proposal will dramatically change the state’s referendum process. The bill, advanced by a 93-54 vote in the House of Representatives, would amend the Maine Constitution to require sponsors of ballot campaigns to obtain a percentage of voter signatures from each of Maine’s two congressional districts. Maine voters, who are the final arbiters in all changes to the Constitution, could vote on the change in November if the bill passes.

Editorials: Thousands of Voters Are Disenfranchised by North Carolina’s Voting Restrictions | Ari Berman/The Nation

A month after the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act, North Carolina passed the country’s most sweeping voting restrictions. The Supreme Court refused to block key parts of the law—cuts to early voting, the elimination of same-day registration, a prohibition on voting in the wrong precinct—just weeks before the 2014 Election. As a result of the new restrictions, there were lengthy lines and confusion at many polling places, and longtime voters were turned away from the polls. Democracy North Carolina has estimated that “the new voting limitations and polling place problems reduced turnout by at least 30,000 voters in the 2014 election.” In a new report, the group analyzed provisional ballots cast during the 2014 election and concluded that 2,344 rejected ballots would have been counted if the new restrictions were not in place.

Editorials: Ohio suffers from extreme gerrymandering | The Columbus Dispatch

Last Tuesday’s Dispatch editorial, “ Clinton off-base on Ohio voting rules,” and the Friday letter “ Clinton did not mention Ohio, Kasich” from Randall Morrison brought attention to the important issue of voter suppression. However, voter suppression is broader and more insidious than the length of early-voting rules. The real “elephant in the room” of representative democracy is gerrymandering, and Ohio represents one of the worst cases in the country. Rigged Ohio House and Senate and U.S. House district lines have resulted in Republicans controlling 12 out of 16 U.S. House seats and huge majorities in the Ohio House and Senate.

Tennessee: Council member’s spreadsheet appears to end Nashville’s early voting chaos | WKRN

The chaotic status concerning Nashville’s early voting less than two months out from a critical city election has stabilized after a compromise that seemed to start with a spreadsheet from a Metro Council member. Last week, the Davidson County Election Commission voted to shut down all but one early voting site without an additional $868,000 in additional funding from the Metro Council. It created an outcry that included Tennessee House Speaker Beth Harwell, Mayor Karl Dean and several of the seven candidates running for mayor. That’s when Bellevue-area Metro Council member Sheri Weiner stepped in late last week with her spreadsheet and some numbers that has satisfied both her fellow council members on the budget committee and the chair of the election commission.

Burundi: President swears in new electoral commission members | Xinhua

Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza Tuesday swore in two new members of the National Independent Electoral Commission (CENI). Annonciate Niyonkuru and Alice Nijimbere replace Spes-Caritas Ndironkeye and Illuminata Ndabahagamye, who resigned earlier this month. The two new members took their oath before the Burundian president in the presence of both chambers of the parliament and diplomats accredited to Burundi.

Japan: Voting Age Lowered to 18 Amid ‘Silver’ Surge at the Polls | Bloomberg

Japan’s upper house approved a bill lowering the voting age to 18 from 20 on Wednesday, a move unlikely to lessen the dominance of the “silver” vote in one of Asia’s most-rapidly aging countries. The change will add about 2.4 million people to the almost 104 million who were eligible to vote in the December general election. The new law is likely to take effect in time for an upper house election scheduled for 2016. The views of younger Japanese are barely reflected in politics, as they are increasingly outnumbered by the swelling ranks of their elders and because they are less likely to vote. Nonetheless, both the main ruling Liberal Democratic Party and the biggest opposition group, the Democratic Party of Japan, backed today’s change in the hope of gaining more support from new voters.

National: Hack the vote: Cyber experts say ballot machines easy targets | Fox News

The recent cyber theft of millions of personnel records from the federal government was sophisticated and potentially crippling, but hackers with just rudimentary skills could easily do even more damage by targeting voting machines, according to security experts. Voter fraud is nearly as old as elections themselves, and different states and precincts use different voting systems and machines. But in many cases, even the electronic ballots could be manipulated remotely, according to a new report by the Commonwealth Security and Risk Management for the Virginia Information Technologies Agency. That report found that the AVS WINVote machines Virginia has used since 2002 have such flimsy security that an amateur hacker could change votes from outside a polling location.

Editorials: The election reforms that could heal American democracy | Sean McElwee/Salon

Since America’s founding, the franchise has been dramatically expanded in waves: first, universal suffrage for all men (first, through the abolition of property ownership requirements for white men, then the 15th Amendment) then the expansion of suffrage to women and finally the Voting Rights Act, which abolished poll taxes and literacy tests. Today, the franchise is still under fire, from racially biased voter ID laws and felon disenfranchisement, as well as our complex registration system. Automatic voter registration and the abolition of voter ID laws could be part of the next wave of the slow march to true democracy. Recently, Hillary Clinton called out Republicans for their strategy of suppressing the vote and then called for automatic voting registration. While many pundits quickly chalked this up to an attempt to revive “the Obama coalition,” in fact, Clinton has been pushing for democracy reforms since before “the Obama coalition” existed. In 2005 she and Senator Barbara Boxer put forward the “Count Every Vote Act.” The law would have made same-day registration the law of the land, expanded early voting and made election day a holiday. In addition, Clinton has been fighting against felon disenfranchisement, though Rand Paul, who has a penchant for receiving praise for things he hasn’t done, has recently been garnering credit for his talk on the subject.

Voting Blogs: Alphabetically ordered ballots make elections less fair and distort the composition of legislatures : Democratic Audit UK

Conventional political wisdom suggests the candidate listed first on a ballot enjoys a slight windfall of votes cast by those who don’t know or care enough to consider all their options. By focusing on particular elections, researchers have neglected to consider the broad consequences of arbitrary ballot ordering rules on legislative representation. To evaluate the substantive significance of ballot order rules, I compare the legislators of states that alphabetically order ballots to legislators elected by states that randomize or rotate ballot order. My research suggests that the seemingly innocuous choice of some states to alphabetize ballots has significantly altered the composition of state legislatures and even Congress. Scholarly interest in how ballots are designed and organized predates the explosion of interest in the subject generated by the 2000 Presidential Election. Most studies suggest the first candidate listed on a ballot enjoys an above average number of votes in certain elections. The less that voters know or care about the election, the greater the windfall of votes to the first listed candidate. Think how often you click the first link in Google search results and don’t bother to consider all your options. However, when the stakes are relatively high, as in partisan legislative elections, scholars suggest ballot order has little or no influence on voters. Accordingly, some have concluded that the distortions induced by ballot order are confined to low-level elections and do not affect the general political landscape. I was sceptical of this sanguine assessment of ballot order effects and looked at the impact of alphabetically ordering ballots on high-level legislative offices. I found that the practice of alphabetically ordering ballots, used in a number of states, significantly distorts the composition of their state legislatures and congressional delegations in favour of representatives with early-alphabet names.

Arkansas: Martin Picks Provider New State Voting Gear | Arkansas Online

Secretary of State Mark Martin has decided to purchase a statewide, integrated voting system, including new voting equipment, through a Nebraska-based company although its proposal costs millions more than systems offered by two other companies. The company, Elections Systems & Software (ES&S), submitted a proposal costing $29,928,868; California-based Unisyn Voting Solutions submitted $24,407,805; and Austin, Texas-based Hart InterCivic proposed $18,789,997, Martin spokesman Chris Powell said Monday. When it requested proposals from companies, Martin’s office said they couldn’t exceed $30 million. “The primary factor in the selection of ES&S was capabilities,” Powell said.

Voting Blogs: Arkansas Chooses New Statewide Voting System | Election Academy

A few weeks ago, I wrote about how county clerks in Arkansas were looking forward to a new voting system but worried about plans to upgrade the system before the state’s March 2016 presidential primary.

While much of that uncertainty remains, at least they now know what machines they’re going to get after an announcement by the Secretary of State yesterday – though even that decision is raising some question about costs. … Of course, just identifying the vendor and a potential cost still leaves some very key variables – namely, delivery schedule and cost – though the Secretary’s spokesman suggested that fast-tracking the implementation is no longer on the table as the state continues to work on funding the purchase.

Editorials: In voting, will California finally enter the 21st century? | LA Times

The era of the neighborhood polling place with its paper voter rolls and rickety booths isn’t quite over, but it is well on its way out in California. No tears will be shed here: It’s high time the state entered the 21st century. That’s the opinion of new Secretary of State Alex Padilla as well. Last week he unveiled his second proposal to encourage voter participation in California: a plan to send mail-in ballots to every registered voter and to encourage counties to set up voting centers for their voters to use, regardless of precinct, up to 10 days before election day.

Texas: In Voting Rights, Who’s a Person? | The Texas Tribune

When most people hear the phrase “one person, one vote,” they don’t stop to think about who counts as a person. The U.S. Supreme Court gets to answer that in a case — Evenwel v. Abbott — that started here in Texas. The plaintiffs contend their votes don’t count as much as those of voters in other state Senate districts because the districts are designed to have the same number of humans in them, not the same number of voters. It’s a simple idea, but changing who’s counted — the voters, instead of the humans — would wreck the country’s political maps, particularly in states like Texas where large numbers of people are not eligible to vote.

Argentina: Santa Fe Begins Recount After Vote Split Three Ways | Bloomberg

Argentina’s fourth biggest voting district will carry out a recount after the election for state governor was evenly split three ways on Sunday.Electoral authorities for Santa Fe province, which represents about 8 percent of the electorate, should complete the recount within 10 days, Cabinet Chief Anibal Fernandez said on Monday. With 95 percent of votes counted, Miguel Lifschitz of the Socialist Party alliance that currently holds the governorship had 30.69 percent of the total, against 30.58 percent for Miguel Del Sel of Mauricio Macri’s PRO alliance. Omar Perotti of President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner’s Victory Front alliance had 29.5 percent of the votes.“There are many strange things,” Del Sel said in a press conference Monday. “The people and us want to know what the final result was because if not we will begin to lose our trust in democracy.”

Bangladesh: Election Commission weighs no holiday on vote days | bdnews24

The Election Commission (EC) is weighing doing away with the general holiday on election days, arguing it affects voter turnout. But former chief election commissioner ATM Shamsul Huda has scoffed at the idea, dubbing it as “unrealistic”. Voting days are public holidays in Bangladesh to facilitate balloting. The country enjoys holiday during general elections, but in local polls, only areas where balloting takes place enjoy the facility.

Canada: Trudeau wants to do away with first past the post | Macleans

Justin Trudeau wants this fall’s national vote to be the last federal election conducted under the first-past-the-post electoral system. And, if the Liberal leader becomes prime minister, it may also be the last election in which Canadians can choose not to vote and the last in which they can only vote by marking an X on a paper ballot. Changing the way Canadians vote is just one element of a sweeping, 32-point plan to “restore democracy in Canada” that Trudeau is poised to announce today.

China: Hong Kong Election Plan Appears Unlikely to Win Lawmakers’ Approval | New York Times

Six months after the protests that paralyzed parts of Hong Kong for weeks, lawmakers here are set to reject the proposal that triggered the demonstrations, intending to vote down a plan vetted in Beijing that would change the way this former British colony selects its top official. Barring last-minute changes of heart by a handful of representatives, backers and opponents alike say the local government lacks the votes to secure passage of the proposal, which would allow all of Hong Kong’s registered voters to pick the chief executive from a slate of up to three candidates chosen by a panel dominated by Beijing loyalists. If the measure is defeated, Hong Kong will keep its current system, in which a small, elite group of about 1,200 selects the chief executive. Any future efforts to expand the franchise would be put in limbo.

China: Hong Kong Democracy Protesters Take to the Streets Ahead of a Crucial Reform Bill | TIME

Nine months after the Umbrella Revolution began, pro-democracy protesters again took to the streets of Hong Kong to demand a say in the way the city’s leader is elected in polls slated for 2017. A crowd of 2,000 to 3,000 people — workers and families as well as students and democracy activists — marched on Sunday afternoon from Victoria Park, a traditional gathering place for protests, to the legislature buildings downtown. Many carried yellow umbrellas — adopted as the symbol of Hong Kong’s democracy movement after protesters took to carrying them during last year’s unrest to protect themselves from police pepper spray.