The Voting News Weekly: The Voting News Weekly for October 19-25 2015

The ballot has been a political battleground since the dawn of the republic. But the voting-rights arms race that ramped up during the Obama Administration will be on full display in November 2016, when 15 states will have new restrictions in place for the first time during a presidential election, while at least two states will have automatic voter registration. Nathaniel Persily looked at Evenwel v. Abbott, in which appellants are asking the Supreme Court to redefine the “one person, one vote” rule so that districts may be drawn only around eligible voters. The Senate Reapportionment Committee voted 4-3 along party lines to bring a Republican-leaning map to the floor next Tuesday but its prospects for passage remained cloudy. A federal judge on Friday refused a request from state lawmakers to dismiss a challenge to the North Carolina voter ID law. A panel of three federal judges ruled that the 12 House of Delegates districts that Democrats challenged in federal court are constitutional. Since abandoning his presidential bid, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and the Republican controlled legislature have fast-tracked bills that would dramatically change the state’s campaign finance laws and restructure the Governemnt Accountability Board that oversees election administration. Prime minister-designate Justin Trudeau has promised that Monday’s election would be the final one ever conducted using the traditional first-past-the-post system and foreign observers observing the ‘Exile Tibetan Primary Elections’ said that “Tibetans in Exile will further strengthen the moral example they display to the world.”