Can Shortest-Splitline Districting Stop Gerrymandering in Indiana?
November 3, 2026
By Jeffy Samuel
Indiana has garnered some national attention in recent months as a result of a national campaign to gerrymander congressional maps mid-decade. Indiana marked one of a few examples in which Republican state legislators broke ranks and refused to draw a more aggressive map that would unseat the state’s two Democrat incumbents. One proposed map would “crack” Indianapolis between four different districts in order to dilute Democratic Party voters. While Indiana’s Republicans managed to avoid bending the knee to the national party, it came at a cost for those rebelling incumbents in the State Senate who were up for re-election. Five of the seven legislators whom the President had targeted for breaking ranks either retired or were defeated in their party primaries before the election.
The Alabama Supreme Court Sidesteps the Question of Residency and Keeps Alabama Courts out of Candidate Eligibility Disputes
November 3, 2026
By Elizabeth Flachbart
The drawn-out legal battle over Senator Tommy Tuberville’s gubernatorial candidacy, and Alabama’s residency requirements, came to an end in early October at the Alabama Supreme Court. As discussed in my previous article covering this litigation, Tuberville’s Republican primary opponent, Ken McFeeters, challenged whether Tuberville met Alabama’s constitutional requirement that governors have been Alabama residents for seven years. Formal litigation began after McFeeters launched an unsuccessful challenge before the Alabama Republican Party. After McFeeters filed in Alabama circuit court, the court dismissed the case for lack of subject matter jurisdiction under Alabama’s jurisdiction-stripping statute, which heavily restricts the types of election suits Alabama courts can hear. On October 9th, the Alabama Supreme Court affirmed the circuit court’s dismissal. The court did not evaluate whether Tuberville met the residency requirement (as that issue was not before the court). The Supreme Court simply concluded that the circuit court lacked jurisdiction to hear the case at all.
Maryland’s Question 3
November 3, 2026
By Peter Favret
In early September, the Maryland Supreme Court held that a consequential redistricting ballot question could go to voters in November’s election, over the objection of two dissenting judges. The question, if voters were to approve it, would enshrine an amendment into Maryland’s constitution clarifying that redistricting standards which are currently in the constitution apply only to state elections, not any congressional districting plan. The question would also grant original jurisdiction to the Supreme Court of Maryland to review districting plans.
Voter Eligibility Challenges in California
November 3, 2026
By Thomas Callahan
On Oct. 15, 2026, the Department of Justice sued the State of California and Los Angeles County for not reviewing a list of 20,000 individuals it believed were unlawfully registered to vote in the State. On Oct. 28, a federal district court judge rejected the DOJ’s request that ballots cast by those individuals be segregated. While the DOJ has appealed the ruling, the Ninth Circuit also seems skeptical of the Department’s claims. Although DOJ’s efforts seemed to have hit a wall, California law has a process for challenging voter registration and voter eligibility both before and after voting starts.
Locked In and Locked Out: How Connecticut’s Nursing Home Voting Mandate Clashes with Federal Disability Law
November 3, 2026
By Guillem Colom
When state legislatures erect procedural walls around the ballot to prevent fraud, good intentions can lead to disenfranchisement. In Connecticut, this tension recently surfaced over how the state treats voters in nursing homes, rest homes, and assisted living centers. Invoking ballot-security interests, Connecticut historically subjected institutionalized voters to mandatory supervised absentee voting, treating care facilities as zones of suspicion. However, after formal administrative advocacy and the threat of federal litigation led by the Center for Public Representation and Disability Rights Connecticut, the Office of the Secretary issued a binding interpretative opinion in April 2026 enumerating the voting rights of institutionalized voters.
The controversy centered on Connecticut General Statutes § 9-159q, which authorizes municipal registrars of voters to conduct supervised absentee balloting inside residential health care facilities. The statute envisioned supervised voting as a shield against undue coercion, directing bipartisan teams of registrars to visit long-term care facilities to deliver ballots in person, oversee their completion, and retrieve them for counting.
In practice, this apparatus functioned as an exclusionary voting barrier. Facility staff systematically channeled residents away from conventional voting methods, and registrars routinely failed to coordinate with residents’ medical and therapeutic schedules, arriving for a single visit that left voters who were asleep or hospitalized without an opportunity to vote. More fundamentally, Connecticut’s statutory system stripped institutionalized voters of their personal agency. When a voter needed physical assistance to read, mark, or seal their ballot, registrars often insisted that only municipal poll workers could provide it. Spouses, children, trusted friends, and personal assistants were enjoined assisting, and these voters were further compelled to disclose their political choices rather than vote privately or with accommodations. or with accommodations.
Connecticut’s procedure likely collided headfirst with federal voting rights guarantees, most notably Section 208 of the Voting Rights Act, or 52 U.S.C. § 10508. Section 208 codifies an unambiguous federal obligation that any voter who requires assistance to vote by reason of blindness, disability, or inability to read or write “may be given assistance by a person of the voter’s choice,” excluding only the voter’s employer or union representative.
Congress enacted Section 208 because it recognized that requiring a voter to accept assistance from government officials or unfamiliar third parties incentivizes intimidation and compromises voter privacy. Federal district and appellate courts consistently hold in numerous cases, including OCA-Greater Houston v. Texas and Disability Rights NC v. North Carolina Board of Elections, that state statutes circumscribing this right are preempted under the Supremacy Clause. Although never litigated, Connecticut’s practice of bestowing municipal registrars a monopoly over ballot assistance in care facilities likely contravened Section 208.
Connecticut’s system also likely ran afoul of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). As the Supreme Court elucidated in Tennessee v. Lane, Title II represents a valid exercise of Fourteenth Amendment authority to dismantle systemic barriers that burden fundamental rights, including the right to vote. The ADA’s integration mandate requires public entities to administer services and programs in the most integrated setting appropriate to the needs of qualified individuals with disabilities. Forcing voters into segregated and supervised balloting sessions, while denying them conventional accommodations available to other citizens, likely constituted voter discrimination under federal law.
Connecticut’s experience remediating these systemic deficiencies in its statute can instruct other states on how to balance their interest in preventing fraud with voters’ interest in accessibility. The Office of the Secretary’s opinion articulated that institutionalized voters retain an uninhibited right to request, receive, and return standard absentee ballots independently; maintain the right to select an assistant of their choice, including family members, to assist them at every stage of voting; and that municipal election authorities must ensure that voters have accessible voting technology and timely registration accommodations. This all-encompassing response, though reactive to litigation threats, seeks to anticipate accommodation concerns for future voters.
As millions of Americans live in nursing homes and need help voting, Connecticut’s reform offers a potentially vital lesson for election administrators nationwide. While preventing undue influence is a recognized state interest, as acknowledged in Burson v. Freeman, states should not pursue ballot integrity by treating voters with disabilities as wards of the state. True electoral integrity does not require quarantining vulnerable voters behind administrative gates. Rather, it requires guaranteeing the dignity and autonomy that federal law demands.
Disabled Voting in Colorado
November 3, 2026
By Lyza Weisman
It can be very difficult for people with disabilities to have privacy while voting. Depending on their disability, they may be unable to fill out their ballot, read their ballot, get to polling locations, or experience other difficulties when voting. Recognizing this, Colorado has recognized disabled individuals’ right to vote privately and independently. To ensure this right is protected, Colorado has implemented multiple laws to improve access.
Peace of Mind at the Polls: New Jersey’s Efforts to Ensure Election Security
November 3, 2026
By William & Mary Law Student Contributor
The New Jersey Division of Elections has been on a gradual path towards making voting in the general election easier for its citizens. At its present state, New Jersey voters can cast their vote via mail-in ballot, in-person early voting, and in-person at a polling facility on election day. With flexible voting options comes an enhanced concern about election safety and public trust in the election process itself. New Jerseyans have legitimate reasons to be skeptical of the upcoming results of the midterm elections, especially in the wake of Governor Sherill’s announcement in July that a software error enabled 6,000 non-citizens to be added to the state’s registered voter list (roughly 400 of which casted votes between 2023 and 2026). With New Jersey’s error forming the backdrop of the midterm elections, New Jersey officials are proactively imposing a series of security measures to increase public trust and ensure that the results of the election are accurate. In doing so, Attorney General Jennifer Davenport, along with municipalities within the state, has formulated a plan to ensure the upcoming election is safe and trusted.
Felons and the Franchise: The Case of Puerto Rico
November 3, 2026
By William & Mary Law Student Contributor
Felon voting laws in the United States are rooted in the English common law practice of “civil death”: criminal penalties, including revocation of the right to vote, imposed on the grounds that by voluntarily committing a crime, people with felony convictions have taken themselves out of the political community. Section Two of the Fourteenth Amendment acknowledges that participation in crime can negatively impact voting rights. But aside from this, the states have broad discretion in deciding how to disenfranchise felons. The notion that people with felony convictions deserve lesser voting protections was recently confirmed in Jones v. Governor of Florida, with the Ninth Circuit holding that “States may restrict voting by people with felony convictions in ways that would be impermissible for other citizens.”
No Weapons, No Pressure, No Problem? How Public Act 26-42 Redraws Connecticut’s Electoral Landscape
October 15, 2026
By Guillem Colom
On Election Day 2024, Stamford, Connecticut, voters approaching the polls encountered more than campaign signs and voting instructions. A uniformed police officer stood at each of the city’s twenty-two polling places as Connecticut police departments prepared for heightened political animosities and potential electoral disruptions. City officials cited public safety concerns to justify the presence, but the scene also raised a more complicated question: when does security make voters feel protected, and when does it make voting feel policed?
Saving or Suppressing the Right to Vote: The Florida SAVE Act
October 15, 2026
By Megan Husi
As of September 14, 2026, the Safeguarding American Voter Eligibility Act, often referred to as the SAVE Act or SAVE America Act, has been stalled in the U.S. Senate due to Democratic opposition, though some Republican lawmakers have indicated that they will try to push the act’s key reforms through the reconciliation process. Despite Congress’s stalemate, several state legislatures, including Florida, have taken matters into their own hands and enacted laws with similar provisions.