|
|
|
Missouri court permanently blocks key part of voter photo ID
U.S. Court News |
2020/01/15 10:08
|
The Missouri Supreme Court on Tuesday permanently blocked a central portion of a 2016 voter identification law that it said had required a “misleading” and “contradictory” sworn statement from people lacking a photo ID.
The 5-2 ruling upholds a decision by a lower court judge, who had blocked the affidavit requirement from being used in the 2018 general election. It had remained on hold since then.
Missouri is one of several states where Republican-led legislatures have passed voter photo ID laws touted as a means of preventing election fraud. In Missouri’s case, the state law was accompanied by a constitutional amendment, approved by 63% of voters in November 2016, that authorized the implementation of a photo ID law.
Voter photo ID laws have been opposed by Democrats, who contend they can disenfranchise poor, elderly, disabled and minority voters who are less likely to have photo IDs.
Missouri’s law allowed voters lacking a valid government-issued photo identification to cast a regular ballot if they presented another form of ID — such as utility bill, bank statement or paycheck containing their name and address — and signed a sworn statement affirming their identity. The sworn statement also included a section acknowledging that they didn’t have “a form of personal identification approved for voting” but were aware they could get a free ID card from the state.
The law said voters lacking a photo ID also could cast a provisional ballot, which would count if they later returned with a photo ID or their signatures matched the ones on file with election authorities.
The Supreme Court said the sworn statement was inaccurate because it required people to say they didn’t possess a valid form of identification for voting while simultaneously requiring them to show a non-photo identification that would allow them to vote.
“Although the State has an interest in combating voter fraud, requiring individuals ... to sign a contradictory, misleading affidavit is not a reasonable means to accomplish that goal,” Judge Mary Russell wrote in the majority opinion.
The Supreme Court also upheld the lower court’s decision to block the secretary of state’s office from disseminating any materials indicating that a photo ID is required to vote. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Trump Gets Woman’s Suit Delayed Until NY Top Court Weighs In
U.S. Court News |
2020/01/05 10:00
|
President Donald Trump got a reprieve in a former “Apprentice” contestant’s lawsuit over his response to her sexual assault allegations, when appeals judges gave him permission to appeal to New York’s highest court and put proceedings on hold in the meantime.
Trump’s lawyers have been trying to get Summer Zervos’ defamation suit delayed through his presidency or dismissed altogether.
Courts so far have said no, but Trump’s attorneys can now try to persuade the top-level state Court of Appeals to hear the case. Tuesday’s ruling also holds off other pretrial action until the high court decides. Trump had been due to undergo sworn pretrial questioning by Jan. 31, under an agreement the two sides reached last fall.
Trump’s lawyers said they were pleased with the ruling.
“We believe that the Court of Appeals will agree that the U.S. Constitution bars state court actions while the president is in office,” Kasowitz Benson Torres LLP said in a statement.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
To overcome travel ban, some Americans taking cases to court
U.S. Court News |
2019/12/23 09:00
|
Mohammed Hafar paced around the airport terminal — first to the monitor to check flight arrivals, then to the gift shop and lastly to the doors where international passengers were exiting.
At last, out came Jana Hafar, his tall, slender, dark-haired teen daughter who had been forced by President Donald Trump’s travel ban to stay behind in Syria for months while her father, his wife and 10-year-old son started rebuilding their lives in Bloomfield, New Jersey, with no clear idea of when the family would be together again.
“Every time I speak to her, she ask, ‘When are they going to give me the visa?’” the elder Hafar said, recalling the days of uncertainty that took up the better part of this year. There was “nothing I could tell her, because nobody knows when.”
That she landed at Kennedy Airport on a recent December day was testament to her father’s determination to keep his promise that they would be reunited and his willingness to go as far as suing the government in federal court. Advocates say the process for obtaining a travel ban waiver is still shrouded in unpredictability, which causes delays for thousands of American citizens waiting for loved ones.
The “system is messed up,” said Curtis Morrison, the Los Angeles-based attorney who has filed several federal lawsuits, including Hafar’s, against the administration on behalf of dozens of plaintiffs from countries affected by the travel ban.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Activists cheer victory in landmark Dutch climate case
U.S. Court News |
2019/12/22 09:05
|
In a ruling hailed as an “immense victory for climate justice,” the Netherlands’ top court ruled Friday in favor of activists who have for years been seeking legal orders to force the Dutch government into cutting greenhouse gas emissions.
Activists in a packed chamber of the Supreme Court in The Hague erupted into applause and cheers as Presiding Judge Kees Streefkerk rejected the government’s appeal against earlier rulings ordering the government to cut emissions by at least 25% by the end of 2020 from benchmark 1990 levels.
The Supreme Court upheld lower courts’ rulings that protection from the potentially devastating effects of climate change was a human right and that the government has a duty to protect its citizens.
Urgenda, the Dutch climate and sustainability organization that filed the original case, hailed the ruling as “a groundbreaking decision that confirms that individual governments must do their fair share to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”
“I am extremely happy that the highest court in the Netherlands has confirmed that climate change is a real, severe problem and that government should do what they themselves have declared for more than 10 years is necessary, namely between 25% and 40% reduction of CO2,” Urgenda director Marjan Minnesma told The Associated Press outside the court.
Faiza Oulahsen of Greenpeace in the Netherlands called the ruling “an immense victory for climate justice.”
Reacting to the decision at his weekly press conference, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said: “I can guarantee we will do everything we can to achieve the goal.” |
|
|
|
|
|
Legal Marketing News RSS
