North Carolina: Court ruling adds uncertainty to North Carolina elections | Charlotte Observer

The potentially landmark ruling that struck down North Carolina congressional districts adds more uncertainty for candidates – and voters – barely a month before the official start of election season. The ruling Tuesday from a federal three-judge panel also carries national implications and continues more than a decade of court intervention in the drawing of North Carolina election districts. It leaves the boundaries for the state’s 13 congressional districts uncertain ahead of the Feb. 12 start of candidate filing. “Since the 2010 (U.S.) Census we’ve had seven, now eight years of perpetual redistricting,” said Andy Yates, a Republican political consultant. “This constant flux is not good for anybody.”

North Carolina: North Carolina’s Novel Anti-Partisan-Gerrymander Ruling | The Atlantic

Federal judges have yet again struck down North Carolina’s congressional districts as an unconstitutional gerrymander, dealing Republicans a blow and throwing the state’s maps into chaos just months before a pivotal midterm election. A three-judge panel, including one circuit-court judge and two district-court judges, ruled Tuesday evening that the Old North State’s redistricting plan relied too heavily on partisan affiliation in drawing constituencies, violating citizens’ rights under the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, the First Amendment, and Article I of the Constitution. The decision is the first time a federal court has ever struck down a redistricting plan as a partisan gerrymander. The final word, however, will likely come from the Supreme Court, which is considering two partisan-gerrymandering cases.

North Carolina: Durham elections worker pleads guilty to altering vote counts in 2016 primary | WRAL

A former Durham County elections worker has pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor related to the mishandling of provisional ballot results during the March 2016 primary election, officials said Wednesday. Richard Robert Rawling, 59, of Cary, pleaded guilty last Friday to failure to discharge a duty of his office and was sentenced to 30 days in jail, suspended to a year on probation and a $500 fine, according to the State Board of Elections and Ethics Enforcement. An obstruction of justice charge was dismissed. Elections board officials discovered the problem during a routine audit of primary results in April 2016. The issue involved provisional ballots, which are given to voters who experience some sort of administrative issue when they show up at a polling place, such as a glitch in voter registration or trying to cast a ballot in the wrong precinct.

North Carolina: Judges order overhaul of North Carolina’s partisan congressional districts | Reuters

A three-judge federal panel ordered congressional districts in North Carolina to be redrawn ahead of the 2018 elections, ruling on Tuesday that the current Republican-drawn map was illegal and unconstitutionally partisan. The judges said the state legislator responsible for the 2016 map had said he drew it to give Republican candidates an advantage. “But that is not a choice the Constitution allows legislative map drawers to make,” the court said. Ralph Hise, North Carolina’s state Senate Redistricting Chairman, said through a spokeswoman that lawmakers would appeal.

North Carolina: Redistricting cases cost taxpayers $5.6 million | The Courier Tribune

The General Assembly has spent almost $5.6 million defending against a continuing series of lawsuits attacking the legislature’s redistricting efforts. And that tab, the official tally through Dec. 18, is sure to keep climbing as lawsuits filed since the Republican-led body’s 2011 redistricting for both state and federal offices continue grinding toward a conclusion, hopefully in time for this year’s elections. Candidate filing starts Feb. 12. In fact, several days before Christmas, attorneys who filed one of the original lawsuits against the General Assembly’s congressional redistricting efforts in 2011 were awarded nearly $1.4 million in legal fees from state coffers for their successful claims of racial gerrymandering, apparently bringing the state’s running tally for the cost of redistricting lawsuits to about $7 million.

North Carolina: Redistricting hearing signals coming end to map-making saga | WRAL

A long legal saga over North Carolina’s state legislative maps drew near an end Friday as a panel of federal judges heard closing arguments over which version of those maps to use during this year’s statehouse elections. The panel’s decision should come soon. Filing in state legislative races begins Feb. 12, and without finished maps, a number of incumbents and potential challengers, including some in Wake County, won’t know in which districts they’re running. There’s also the prospect of another appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, which could come quickly following the lower court’s decision.

North Carolina: Altered Legislative Districts Back in Court | Associated Press

North Carolina legislative districts drawn up by Republicans are back in court as federal judges decide whether to accept proposed boundary changes from the third-party expert they appointed. The three-judge panel scheduled a hearing Friday in Greensboro to listen to why a Stanford University law professor they hired as a special master redrew boundaries the way he did. The judges appointed Nathaniel Persily because they were concerned new state House and Senate maps approved by the GOP-controlled legislature last summer failed to remove unlawful racial bias from four districts. House and Senate districts drawn by Republican legislators have been challenged in courts since 2011.

North Carolina: With no North Carolina elections board, Winterville race decided by 1 vote and a judge | News & Observer

Nearly two months have passed since voters went to the polls in Winterville, the small Pitt County town near Greenville, to select its mayor and two Town Council members. On Tuesday, Wake County Superior Court Judge Paul Ridgeway decided the victor in one of the council races — a contest that resulted in a one-vote difference. Ridgeway held a hearing on Dec. 29 to determine whether the Pitt County Board of Elections exceeded its power when it decided to decertify the results from the race between John Hill, Ricky Hines and David Hooks. The case was unusual from the start. The election was held in November to fill a seat that became vacant last year after a councilman died. On Nov. 7, Hill was the unofficial winner with 421 votes, eight more than Hines got that night and 47 more votes than Hooks received.

North Carolina: How far into 2018 before North Carolina knows shape of election districts in gerrymander case? | News & Observer

As 2017 drew to a close, an often repeated phrase among observers of North Carolina politics was the only thing certain about the 2018 elections was uncertainty. With the filing period for candidates seeking state House and Senate seats set to open in mid-February, the lines for the election districts remain unclear. North Carolina lawmakers have canceled primaries for all judicial races and continue to weigh new options for how judges at all levels of state court get to the bench. Answers to some of the lingering questions might emerge early in January as federal judges hold hearings on a case that will determine the shape of election district maps for state legislative races.

North Carolina: With no state board, election challenges go to court | Winston-Salem Journal

As cleanup continues from the most recent North Carolina elections held without a regulatory board to settle disputes, both local and state officials are wondering if the court case that vacated the board will be settled before the next elections in May. County boards and judges — not the state elections board — are still handling appeals from municipal elections in November. They include a mayor’s race that was decided by three votes and a one-vote race where ineligible voters cast ballots. North Carolina hasn’t had a statewide elections board since June because Gov. Roy Cooper is challenging a law that would change the board’s composition to be divided evenly between Republicans and Democrats. Cooper, a Democrat, has gone to court against the GOP-controlled legislature to keep the system that gives the governor’s party a majority of the board’s members. The litigation is now before the state Supreme Court.

North Carolina: Plaintiffs’ lawyers object to expert in redistricting case | Greensboro News & Record

Lawyers for 31 voters suing Republican legislative leaders over racially biased election districts are questioning the other side’s plan for a California political scientist and demographer to testify at a hearing next month. They argue that redistricting consultant Douglas Johnson of Glendale, Calif., should not be allowed to take the stand on Jan. 5 because he has not met a basic, federal requirement that such expert witnesses must file a report in advance covering “all opinions the witness will express and the basis and reasons for them.” “Because legislative defendants have not produced a report for Dr. Johnson, he should not be permitted to offer expert testimony on Jan. 5,” voter lawyers Allison Riggs of Durham and Edwin Speas of Raleigh contend. “Should the court allow him to testify, plaintiffs request that he be ordered to produce a report and be available for deposition prior to Jan. 5.”

North Carolina: Elections website was hacked, but it wasn’t as damaging as it could have been | News & Observer

As the fear of election equipment being hacked grows, the State Board of Elections and Ethics Enforcement wants to get ahead of any potential threats by having additional staff members to address cybersecurity. In a presentation to the Joint Legislative Election Oversight Committee on Friday, Kim Strach, executive director of the state board, said election security is something everyone needs to be concerned about. Strach said there are two types of hacks that the state board has to keep an eye out for – internal and external.

North Carolina: Gerrymander defendants want their own outside expert | Greensboro News & Record

Republican legislative defendants in North Carolina’s racial gerrymandering case hope to call their own California elections expert and a member of the Guilford County Board of Commissioners to testify on their behalf. Raleigh lawyer Phillip Strach has asked a panel of federal judges to approve Glendale, Calif., political scientist Douglas Johnson and Guilford commissioner Hank Henning as witnesses in a hearing scheduled next month on the latest round of voting-district maps. Strach wants testimony from Johnson, Republican commissioner Henning and Republican commissioner Michael Boose of the Cumberland County Board of Commissioners to cast doubt on recent recommendations from the lawsuit’s “special master,” California law professor Nathaniel Persily of Stanford University.

North Carolina: Judge denies legislators’ early hearing request in racial gerrymandering case | Winston-Salem Journal

U.S. District Judge Catherine Eagles has refused a request to hold a crucial hearing in North Carolina’s racial gerrymandering case two weeks sooner than scheduled. Ruling on behalf of the 3-judge panel overseeing the lawsuit, Eagles said the Republican legislators were seeking to “impose their own expedited schedule on the court, the special master and other parties at virtually the last moment.” “The court anticipates that the January 5 hearing will begin with a short presentation by the special master as to his recommendations,” Eagle said in the order. “Thereafter, each side will have one hour to present oral argument in support of their position.”

North Carolina: Voters: ‘Time is of the essence’ in adopting redistricting recommendations | Greensboro News & Record

The North Carolina General Assembly is not entitled to another shot at fixing any remaining racial flaws in its most recent redistricting efforts, voting rights lawyers contend in newly filed court papers. Attorneys for 31 voters who successfully sued the legislature for racial gerrymandering are urging a three-judge, federal panel to resolve the lingering flaws on its own by adopting a “special master” consultant’s recent recommendations. “While courts generally are obligated to give the legislature the first chance to remedy violations in a redistricting plan, they are not required to give the legislature limitless chances to do so,” lawyers Allison Riggs and Edwin Speas assert in their joint petition.

North Carolina: Republicans canceled an election. Now Democrats are going to court | News & Observer

North Carolina Democrats have asked the federal courts to block a law that does away with primaries next year in partisan judicial races. The state Democratic Party and several county parties, including those in Wake, Durham and Orange counties, sued on Tuesday claiming that the law adopted in October by the Republican-led General Assembly is unconstitutional because it prohibits the political party from the “special protection” afforded to it in the First and Fourteenth amendments to select candidates who best represent the party’s philosophies and policies. The Democrats involved with the lawsuit have asked the court to take action before February, when candidate filing for the 2018 elections opens in North Carolina.

North Carolina: Redistricting expert: No ‘racial targeting’ in map fixes | Associated Press

The expert who federal judges asked to redraw some North Carolina House and Senate district lines defended his final recommendations Friday, rejecting Republican arguments that he created boundaries with racial population quotas and helped Democrats. Stanford University law professor Nathaniel Persily released his proposal, which altered two dozen of the General Assembly’s 170 districts, mostly in the counties in or around Raleigh, Greensboro, Charlotte and Fayetteville. Some adjusted districts returned to the shapes that the legislature first drew in 2011. The judges will meet Jan. 5 in Greensboro before deciding whether to adopt the changes, about five weeks before candidate filing begins for next November’s elections. GOP lawmakers already have said it was premature for the judges to hire Persily as a special master, and House Speaker Tim Moore already has signaled map changes could be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

North Carolina: ‘Race-based redistricting’ imposed on NC ‘against its will,’ lawmakers say | News & Observer

Lawmakers and the challengers of maps proposed for electing North Carolina’s General Assembly members waited until the 11th hour to respond to districts suggested by an unaffiliated mapmaker. Lawmakers were critical of the process, saying the federal judges who tapped a Stanford University law professor to draw maps for them had done so prematurely and allowed him to consider race as he looked at election districts in Cumberland, Guilford, Hoke, Mecklenburg, Wake, Bladen, Sampson and Wayne counties. The three federal judges presiding over the case that will determine what districts North Carolina’s state Senate and House members come from in the 2018 elections have yet to rule on maps the lawmakers adopted in August. The judges — James Wynn of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Catherine Eagles and Thomas Schroeder, both of the U.S. Middle District of North Carolina — ordered new lines after the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed their ruling last year that found 28 of the state legislative districts were longstanding unconstitutional racial gerrymanders.

North Carolina: Expert proposes legislative maps in redistricting case | WRAL

A map-making expert brought in by federal judges to rework North Carolina’s House and Senate districts released his proposal Monday. Attorneys on both sides of the underlying lawsuit requiring new maps have until Friday to recommend changes for a plan that’s due Dec. 1 to the federal judges overseeing the redraw. That panel of three judges could accept that map, drawn by Stanford University law professor Nathaniel Persily, or stick with something closer to what the General Assembly’s Republican majority submitted earlier this year. The attorneys who initially sued to change the state’s maps argue that the GOP’s redraw didn’t fully address the racial gerrymander found by the judges and affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court.

North Carolina: Court-appointed specialist draws new maps for gerrymandered House, Senate districts | Greensboro News & Record

An outside expert appointed by a federal court to help redraw some North Carolina legislative districts that judges worry remained unconstitutional — including at least two in Guilford County — has suggested changes. On Monday, Stanford University law professor Nathaniel Persily filed his preliminary House and Senate plans. He also requested formal responses from Republican legislative leaders who originally drew the boundaries and from voters who successfully sued over them. Judges want Persily’s final proposal by Dec. 1. Judges have said four districts redrawn last summer by GOP legislators still appeared to preserve illegal racial bias, so Persily said he redrew compact replacements for them. He also retooled several districts in and around Charlotte and Raleigh because of potential state constitutional problems.

North Carolina: Forsyth County seeks voting machine extension from General Assembly | Winston Salem Chronicle

Forsyth County Board of Elections is hoping the General Assembly will give counties an extension on getting new voting machines. Currently the county is under a state deadline to switch to a paper-based ballot system by next year. The county had planned to replace its current touchscreen voting machines used for early voting with new machines that will produce paper ballots. Plans to test the machines and have them ready by 2018, were sidelined by a legal battle over proposed changes to the makeup of election boards in the state. As North Carolina awaits a ruling, the State BOE’s term expired and the board is currently vacant. Without a state board, there is no one to certify new voting machines for use in the state, so Forsyth can’t get new machines and its current ones will no longer be certified after year’s end.

North Carolina: Senate gears up on judicial redistricting | WRAL

Experts raised questions Wednesday about the constitutionality not only of proposed new judicial districts in North Carolina, but the state’s current ones as well. Years of inattention, preceded by decades of political tinkering, left the districts North Carolina uses to elect judges with unbalanced populations in faster-growing urban areas. That opens them to constitutional attack, a pair of attorneys with a long history in state government told state senators gathered to discuss controversial judicial reforms. The state addressed this issue years ago in Wake County, but similar issues linger in Mecklenburg County and, potentially, in other areas, according to Michael Crowell, the former executive director of North Carolina’s Commission for the Future of Justice and the Courts, and Gerry Cohen, an attorney who worked with the legislature for more than 30 years.

North Carolina: Judge denies challenge of VR Systems election software | Associated Press

With only hours to go before Tuesday’s municipal elections, a trial judge has turned away North Carolina’s effort to avoid using the polling-place software of a company targeted by Russian hackers last year. Lawyers for the state elections board said the Election Day poll book software that VR Systems provides to nearly 30 of North Carolina’s 100 counties hasn’t been officially certified. VR Systems persuaded an administrative law judge last Friday to side with the Florida-based company, which says the software remains approved under the original certification it obtained eight years ago, in October 2009. Superior Court Judge Paul Ridgeway declined to intervene, deferring to Administrative Law Judge Don Overby’s ongoing oversight of the case, including a proposed hearing set for next spring. The elections board formally asked the state Court of Appeals late Monday to delay the enforcement of Overby’s restraining order and preliminary injunction.

North Carolina: Counties OK to use elections software targeted by hackers | News & Observer

Voting software that’s been under a cloud for months can be used in elections next week. The State Board of Elections & Ethics Enforcement is appealing an administrative law judge’s decision Friday allowing counties to use software from a company called VR Systems that checks voters’ registration information. Durham was using VR software on Election Day last year when a malfunction forced the county to switch to paper poll books. The glitch halted voting in some areas, and eight precincts extended voting hours. The state elections board doesn’t want counties to use the software. The board hasn’t certified it, as required by law. In a court complaint, VR Systems said the elections board improperly revoked its license, and that some counties still want to use its product. The company’s court complaint said Mecklenburg County used VR software in the September primaries, and Nash County used it in October, without problems and despite the state prohibition.

North Carolina: Republicans object to special master in North Carolina remap | Associated Press

North Carolina Republican legislative leaders on Monday opposed a plan by federal judges to use an outside expert to help them examine and possibly redraw General Assembly district lines, arguing that it’s premature to hire one and questioning the expert’s impartiality. An attorney for GOP mapmakers objected to the judicial panel’s intentions — announced last week — to appoint a Stanford University law school professor as what’s called a “special master.” The same three judges last year struck down nearly 30 districts originally drawn in 2011 by the GOP-controlled legislature, determining they unlawfully relied too heavily on race. The General Assembly approved new lines in August, but the judges wrote last week they remained concerned that seven House and two Senate districts “either fail to remedy the identified constitutional violation or are otherwise legally unacceptable.”

North Carolina: Governor Roy Cooper would have lost in court vs. lawmakers | News & Observer

A panel of three judges would have ruled against Gov. Roy Cooper in one of his power struggles with state lawmakers, this one over control of elections boards. In a ruling released Tuesday, the judges said that if they had jurisdiction of the case they would have decided that lawmakers had not violated the state Constitution when they created an eight-member board – evenly divided between the major political parties – to preside over state election issues and ethics complaints. The case could determine whether Republicans will have leadership on elections boards at the state and county level during presidential election years when North Carolina voters also elect their governor. The findings from the three judges — L. Todd Burke of Forsyth County, Jesse Caldwell of Gaston County and Jeffrey Foster of Pitt County — put the case back before the state Supreme Court.

North Carolina: Special master named to draw legislative districts | News & Observer

Federal judges announced their plans on Thursday to ask a Stanford University law professor to look at nine North Carolina legislative districts as they weigh the constitutionality of election maps adopted in August. The news came in an order filed in federal court by the three-judge panel asked to decide whether the new maps correct 28 districts drawn in 2011 and later found to be unconstitutional racial gerrymanders. The judges raised questions about seven state House districts and two state Senate districts that “either fail to remedy the identified constitutional violation or are otherwise legally unacceptable.” One Senate district was in Guilford County; the other was in Hoke and Cumberland counties. The House districts were in Wake County, Mecklenburg County and Guilford County. … Judge Catherine Eagles informed the attorneys in the order that Nathaniel Persily, who has helped draw districts for New York, Maryland, Georgia and Connecticut, would review North Carolina’s new legislative maps and possibly help the judges draw new lines for 2018.

North Carolina: Arguments wrap in partisan gerrymander case | WRAL

Arguments wrapped Thursday in a North Carolina lawsuit that aims to change American politics. The case targets partisan gerrymandering in general and North Carolina’s current congressional map in particular. Republican legislators, attorneys for good-government groups argue, drew intensely partisan lines, using detailed data from past elections to produce maps nearly guaranteed to elect 10 Republicans and three Democrats to Congress. Such partisan efforts have long been accepted, but the federal courts may eventually draw a line in the sand. North Carolina’s case is before a three-judge panel and could take months, or even years, to run its course. A similar case out of Wisconsin has already been argued before the U.S. Supreme Court, and the court’s decision is pending.

North Carolina: Stung by Court Rulings, Republicans Aim to Change the Judges | The New York Times

Republicans with a firm grip on the North Carolina legislature — and, until January, the governor’s seat — enacted a conservative agenda in recent years, only to have a steady stream of laws affecting voting and legislative power rejected by the courts. Now lawmakers have seized on a solution: change the makeup of the courts. Judges in state courts as of this year must identify their party affiliation on ballots, making North Carolina the first state in nearly a century to adopt partisan court elections. The General Assembly in Raleigh reduced the size of the state Court of Appeals, depriving Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, of naming replacements for retiring Republicans. And this month, lawmakers drew new boundaries for judicial districts statewide, which critics say are meant to increase the number of Republican judges on district and superior courts and would force many African-Americans on the bench into runoffs against other incumbents.

North Carolina: Veto override means no scheduled judicial primaries in 2018 | News & Observer

Primary elections for trial court and appeals court seats in 2018 have been scrapped after Republicans on Tuesday overrode Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of a bill that foretells potentially more judicial changes ahead. The House voted to make state law a measure — approved two weeks ago then formally objected to by Cooper — that also would delay candidate filing for those judicial races from February to June. The Senate voted Monday night for the override. At least 60 percent of the legislators present in each chamber had to agree to overcome Cooper’s veto. The override marks the latest action by the GOP-controlled General Assembly to retool the judicial branch. Earlier this year, lawmakers passed bills making District Court and Superior Court races officially partisan elections again and reducing through attrition the number of Court of Appeals judges from 15 to 12. Cooper vetoed both of those bills, but they were also overturned.