Updates | The Week of April 10, 2017
Derek Reinbold // 4/16/17 //
On Monday, a federal judge in Texas found that the Texas Voter ID law was passed with discriminatory purpose, in violation of the Voting Rights Act (NYT, WaPo, Dallas News, Election Law Blog).
- The decision can be found here.
- More information about the legal history of the Texas Voter ID case can be found here and here.
The Trump Administration’s plans for the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division raises grave concerns, explain Joshua Matz and Leah Litman at Take Care.
Advocacy groups are concerned about Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ lack of commitment to protecting voting rights, observe Leah Litman and Joshua Matz (Take Care).
Despite a shift by Trump's DOJ, courts are still rooting out racial discrimination in state laws relating to districting and voter identification, writes Danielle Lang (Take Care).
Justice Gorsuch’s position in voting rights cases at the Supreme Court will be especially consequential given Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s unwillingness to combat restrictive voting laws, argues Tierney Sneed (Talking Points Memo).
- Jessica Mason Pieklo likewise analyzes Justice Gorsuch’s possible impact on upcoming free speech cases (Rewire).
The severe income inequality that contributed to President Trump’s victory in November represents a failure of the American political system, argues Kate Andrias (ACSblog).
- Andrias’s piece is part of the ACSblog symposium, The Future of the U.S. Constitution, all of which is available here.
Former CIA Director Michael Hayden says Russian election hacking is not an “act of war,” reports Moran Chalfant (The Hill).