Iowa Secretary of State Matt Schultz said Monday that “everything is on hold right now” after a district court judge’s ruling last week that halted the Iowa Republican from implementing voting rules he established on an emergency basis earlier this year. Polk County District Court Judge Mary Pat Gunderson ruled on Friday that Schultz could have followed normal rule-making procedures and that emergency rules were unnecessary before the November election. In so doing, the judge stayed the rules and issued a temporary injunction, which prevents Schultz from enacting them until the court can hear the full arguments of challenges brought by the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa and the League of United Latin American Citizens of Iowa to stop the rules. Schultz met Monday with Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller, whose office is representing the secretary of state, to discuss options going forward.
After that meeting, Schultz’s spokesman Chad Olsen said “they’re still talking through what their options are but one of the realities of the situation is that given the time frame that we have right now … it is very unlikely that anything will be resolved before the election. “So that’s part of our consideration right now – what’s practical and what’s not and, essentially, since the emergency rule’s been stayed, that may just freeze things until post-election,” Olsen added. “About the only thing we can do is appeal the stay and it seems to be that that might not be a practical solution given the time frame that we’re in.” Schultz told a legislative panel last week that he was not trying to give an advantage to any candidates in November but only doing his job by passing emergency voter rules to make sure that only U.S. citizens vote on Nov. 6
Full Article: Schultz: Voting rule changes are on hold in wake of judge’s ruling.