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.

North Carolina: Legislature opens ballots to third parties in veto override | The North State Journal

The state legislature voted Tuesday for the 10th veto override since Gov. Roy Cooper has been in the Executive Mansion, well more than half of his 13 total vetoes. The lawmakers needed a three-fifths vote to override, voting in the Senate Monday night 26-15 along party lines and in the House Tuesday morning, 72-40. Two Democrats voted in favor of overriding the governor’s veto: Reps. William Brisson (D-Bladen) and Elmer Floyd (D-Cumberland). This time the override is on an election bill aimed at making it easier to get third-party candidates on the state’s election ballots, but also canceling the 2018 judicial primaries. Lawmakers say they want to allow newly eligible candidates to be able to get a closer look at planned new judicial district maps. The effort to update judicial district lines was launched over the summer by Rep. Justin Burr (R- Stanly), but some members of both parties say its overdue.

North Carolina: Senate votes to override election law veto | WRAL

The state Senate voted Monday night to override Gov. Roy Cooper's veto of a measure that would cancel all judicial primary elections in 2018. The House is expected to follow suit Tuesday, although that vote may be delayed. Senate Bill 656 would also make it easier for third-party and unaffiliated candidates to get on the ballot for statewide or municipal races, but not in legislative races. It would also lower the percentage of primary votes required to avoid a runoff. Republican House and Senate leaders say they're canceling the judicial primaries because they intend to redraw the state's Superior Court and District Court districts by next spring, so the primary would likely be delayed.

North Carolina: Partisan gerrymander trial highlights differences from Wisconsin case | News & Observer

Morton Lurie is a Raleigh resident who describes himself as a conservative Republican. On Monday, he was one of the North Carolina voters standing outside a federal courthouse in Greensboro, criticizing a map drawn in 2016 that has given Republicans a 10 to 3 edge in Congress. Though it can be difficult to keep up with all the redistricting lawsuits filed this decade in North Carolina, Lurie is one of the challengers of maps adopted by the Republican-led legislature last year to correct two of the 13 congressional districts found by federal judges to be unconstitutional racial gerrymanders. Lurie objects to districts that are essentially safe seats for one party or another. “The House of Representatives is that part of our government designed to be sensitive to the interests and will of voters spread across the country,” Lurie told media during a break in a trial that started Monday in his lawsuit.

North Carolina: Voting defamation suit seeks to widen net, accuses GOP attorneys of conspiracy | WRAL

The attorneys who brought a defamation lawsuit over voter protests filed in the wake of last November’s election want to add former Gov. Pat McCrory's legal defense fund and the attorneys who helped file those protests to their suit. They also want to turn the case into a class-action suit on behalf of more than 100 people who they say were unfairly maligned when Republicans falsely accused them of casting fraudulent votes. Attorneys for the Southern Coalition for Social Justice argue there was a coordinated effort by attorneys from a well-connected Republican law firm in Virginia to throw the results of North Carolina's close gubernatorial race into doubt. Those attorneys, the lawsuit argues, helped North Carolina voters challenge Democratic votes "to delay certification of the election and suggest that voter fraud affected the election results."

North Carolina: New district maps get hearing from judges | News & Observer

North Carolina's redrawn legislative districts were debated Thursday before a panel of three federal judges who had struck down previous district maps for racial bias. The judges must decide whether to force another redrawing of the boundaries approved by Republicans over the summer or allow them to be used in the 2018 elections. Lawyers representing GOP legislative leaders and dozens of voters who successfully sued to throw out previous districts were subjected to 3½ hours of questioning by the judges, who did not immediately rule. Later Thursday, the judges opened wider the door to choosing an outside expert to make map changes on their behalf. Candidate filing starts in February. The judges had ordered the GOP-dominated legislature to approve new maps by Sept. 1, in keeping with their decision last year that 28 House and Senate districts drawn in 2011 were unlawful racial gerrymanders.

North Carolina: District attorney, nonprofit spar over handling of alleged voter-fraud cases | Charlotte Observer

A group targeting voter fraud in North Carolina has called on the Trump administration to withdraw its nomination of Andrew Murray to be the next U.S. Attorney for what they say is his refusal to prosecute two cases of illegal voting. Murray, the Mecklenburg district attorney, says the allegations are unfounded and that the Voter Integrity Project of Raleigh has mischaracterized his actions as well as the cases they cite. “This office prosecutes crimes of every level every day,” Murray’s office said in a statement Monday. “But prosecuting people when sufficient evidence does not exist simply for the sake of media attention to the Voter Integrity Project’s cause … is simply wrong and unjust. This office does not – and will not – operate that way.”

North Carolina: Cooper vetoes bill eliminating 2018 judicial primary | Carolina Public Press

An elections bill passed in one of several legislative actions in last week’s brief session, has drawn the 13th veto from Gov. Roy Cooper, who objected to a provision eliminating next year’s judicial primaries. “This legislation abolishes a scheduled election and takes away the right of the people to vote for the judges of their choice,” Cooper said in a statement released with Monday’s veto. “It is the first step toward a constitutional amendment that will rig the system so that the legislature picks everybody’s judges in every district instead of letting the people vote for the judges they want. If the legislature doesn’t like the fact that judges are ruling many of their laws unconstitutional, they should change their ways instead of their judges.”

North Carolina: State’s gerrymandering dilemma heats up | Salon

North Carolina has long been a battleground state for Republicans and Democrats. And for many of its politicians, the same timeworn tool has plagued both parties. Gerrymandering, a term used to describe drawing voting districts to benefit whomever happens to be drawing the lines, dates back to 19th century Massachusetts governor Elbridge Gerry. Gerry was the first noted politician to shape a voting district in favor of himself so blatantly that one voter noted the shape of his district resembled a salamander, to which another voter replied, "No, it looks like a gerrymander,” and the term was born. The practice of gerrymandering for partisan purposes has been a tried and true weapon in the arsenal of political gain since the beginning of democratic elections. However, the practice of gerrymandering to disenfranchise minority groups was a ticking time bomb for North Carolina Republicans. Not to mention completely illegal.

North Carolina: Lawmakers plan to cancel 2018 judicial primaries | WRAL

State House and Senate leaders have agreed on a provision that cancels the 2018 primary elections for all judicial races and district attorneys. The provision was tacked onto the conference report for Senate Bill 656, titled the "Electoral Freedom Act." Most of the bill deals with easing ballot access requirements for third parties as well as for unaffiliated candidates. It also lowers the threshold for a primary candidate to win his or her party's nomination from 40 percent of the primary vote to 30 percent. "There are many folks in here who would seek to do away with the second [runoff] primary altogether," sponsor Rep. David Lewis, R-Harnett, told the House Rules Committee Wednesday evening. "This would be a step at least in the direction of those who feel that way."

North Carolina: New York Times story on Russian election hacking peeves North Carolina officials | The Washington Post

The New York Times never reported that election systems in Durham, N.C., had succumbed to Russian hacking. In fact, the story indicated straight-up that “no clear-cut evidence of digital sabotage has emerged, much less a Russian role in it.” Even so, the Sept. 2 front-page story by Nicole Perlroth, Michael Wines and Matthew Rosenberg did quote an election “troubleshooter” as saying something suspicious regarding irregularities on Election Day in Durham: “It felt like tampering, or some kind of cyberattack,” Susan Greenhalgh told the newspaper. There were indeed difficulties, as laid out in the lede of the story by Perlroth, et al. So-called e-poll books — essentially digital rolls that guide voting-day check-ins — malfunctioned, resulting in potential voters leaving in frustration or standing in line, annoyed. The state’s vendor for e-poll books was VR Systems, a Florida company that was targeted by Russian state hackers, according to a leaked document from the National Security Agency. Many accounts have concluded that VR Systems was “successfully infiltrated,” though the company disputes the characterizations. “Absolutely we deny it,” says VR Systems’s Ben Martin.

North Carolina: Replacing outdated machines will cost Madison County $400,000 | Asheville Citizen-Times

Madison County will have to invest more than $433,000 in new voting equipment before the next presidential election. The local Board of Elections at its monthly meeting inside its offices Sept. 20 discussed a plan to break up the expense over three years. "We'll be replacing the whole voting system, the whole shooting match," said Kathy Ray, the board's director. "In addition to the equipment, we'll need new supplies and materials to accommodate the new voting system." The purchase is necessary because the machines currently in use, touchscreen iVotronic models, will be decertified by the state Sept. 1, 2019. That change will force the county to buy new machines that meet state guidelines. "The county commissioners need to know this," board chairman Jerry Wallin said of the imminent expenditure, adding that the funds will come out of the budget crafted by the five-member panel. Wallin said he hand-delivered a memo outlining a plan to divide the expense over the next three budget years. "Did the county manager (Forrest Gilliam) pass out?" board member Dyatt Smathers asked with a smile.

North Carolina: Slow the redistricting process, engage stakeholders, witnesses say | Bladen Journal

If the separation-of-powers undertones in the judicial redistricting process weren’t already obvious, state Rep. Justin Burr, R-Stanly, left no doubt Tuesday. The General Assembly is exercising its authority to redraw district and Superior Court maps “not for the benefit of lawyers, but for the benefit of the people of this state,” Burr said after presiding over a meeting of the House Select Committee on Redistricting he chairs. Several lawyers and judges agreed during the 2 ½ hour meeting it’s a good idea to update and reconfigure the judicial districts. The most recent time that was done Dwight Eisenhower was president, “The $64,000 Question” was the top-rated TV show, and Mitch Miller and The Drifters were among the biggest pop music acts.

North Carolina: Judges, attorneys caution legislature on judicial redistricting | WRAL

Judges called on state legislators Tuesday to pump the brakes on a plan to redraw judicial and prosecutorial districts around the state, but the man behind the plan said he's aiming for an October vote. They also raised the possibility that some of the currently proposed districts, drawn in part to favor Republican election chances, won't have enough lawyers living in them to produce strong candidate pools. "They are Republican-leaning without many lawyers living in them," Judge Athena Brooks, who described herself as a Republican and spoke for the North Carolina Association of District Court Judges, said of the proposed new map.

North Carolina: Legislative maps done, GOP eyes judicial districts | Associated Press

With approval of new North Carolina legislative districts behind them, House Republicans returned Tuesday to Raleigh to advance their efforts to redraw election districts for trial court judges and local prosecutors. Unlike a federal court's mandate to approve House and Senate districts before a Sept. 1 deadline, Republicans in the chamber aren't being forced to perform redistricting on the boundaries for Superior Court and District Court judgeships and for district attorneys. In fact, a judicial expert from the UNC School of Government told representatives at the first meeting of the House judicial redistricting committee that wholesale changes to judicial maps haven't been completed since the advent of the state's modern court system in 1955.

North Carolina: Two Republicans say they accidentally asked the Supreme Court to end gerrymandering | News & Observer

Two of the three North Carolina lawmakers who had joined with prominent national politicians to oppose gerrymandering have now backtracked, saying they didn’t mean to add their names on an anti-gerrymandering letter sent to the Supreme Court. Rep. Mark Meadows and Rep. Walter Jones, both Republicans, signed on to the legal brief along with Democratic Rep. David Price. Meadows blamed an “error” and Jones blamed “miscommunication” for their participation. Meadows also made a point to say he supports the N.C. General Assembly, which is in charge of drawing the state’s lines for its members of Congress. That means Price is now the only one of North Carolina’s 15 members of Congress who remains involved in the anti-gerrymandering efforts at the Supreme Court. The Chapel Hill lawmaker’s office confirmed Friday that he didn’t sign his name accidentally.

North Carolina: Republicans defend maps before Wisconsin redistricting SCOTUS case | News & Observer

As a key U.S. Supreme Court case on gerrymandering looms, North Carolina Republicans are pushing back against the criticism of their own political maps. Racially motivated gerrymandering is unconstitutional, and within the past two years North Carolina has had to redraw its U.S. House, N.C. House and N.C. Senate districts after all were found to have disenfranchised black voters. The three maps found unconstitutional were drawn in 2011 by Republican state legislators, shortly after they took control of the N.C. General Assembly that year. However, federal courts have long avoided deciding whether politically motivated gerrymandering is also unconstitutional. Democrats for years drew lines to help their party, and Republicans have done the same. Democratic Sen. Jeff Jackson of Charlotte said that of the 4,300 written comments legislators received on the most recent round of redistricting, fewer than 1 percent were in favor.

North Carolina: Lawmakers asked the public to comment on political maps. Here’s the response they got. | News & Observer

When legislators were in the middle of debating changes to North Carolina House and Senate districts last month, they were legally required to seek public input. But they don’t appear to have listened too intently. Of the more than 4,300 written comments that legislators received on redistricting, just 38 were positive, according to Sen. Jeff Jackson, a Charlotte Democrat, who said he got the data from General Assembly staff. “That means 99.2 percent of the comments were opposed to precisely what the redistricting committee went ahead and did anyway — which was to draw the maps to favor one party,” Jackson wrote in a post on the Charlotte Agenda news website.