New information has appeared on the 9CCs website.
The en banc court has ruled that the district court was not wrong in its decision.
What does this mean?
A little background:
The case is called Soutwest Voter Registration v Shelly. The case was brought by several minority voter interest groups. The complaint (that punch-card ballots are a violaton of equal protection rules) was originally heard by a district court, which ruled that the case, while having some merit, did not have a liklihood of success. The district court, therefore, dnied the sought-after injuncton that would have postponed the recall election (as well as two initiatives on the ballot).
The plaintifs appealed the case to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which ruled last week (by a 3 member panel) that there was indeed merit to the case, and that there was a possibility of success by the plaintifs in their complaint. They therefore ordered the postponement of the recall vote. However, they ordered a stay on their own ruling in order for higher authority to hear the case.
Today, the en banc court, after a 'limited review', reveresed the panel's decision, saying that the District Court was correct in its decision not to order the injunction or postpone the lection. They based their decision on three points:
1) The plaintiff, while showing a possibility of success in their case, did not show a high probability of success.
2) The plaintiff failed to show based on the merits of the case that there was a perponderance of hardship for the plainiffs
3) The election is already underway by dint of the fact that absentee voters have already cast their ballots, money has already been spent, funds have already been raised, campaigns have already begun getting out their messages, all with the expectation of an October 7th election date. Thus, postponing the election would cause undue hardship to the public. While they acknowledged that the punch-card ballots might also cause undue hardhip, that case has not been proven, and therefore, they agreed that the perponderance of the hardship would be caused by a postponement.
The Court noted that it was reluctant to enjoin an impending election in any case, and that enjoining an election that has already begun is unprecedented.
What this all means is that the election is still on, and last week's decision by the 3 judge panel no longer stands.
For more details, check out the 9th Circuit Court's website.
http://www.ce9.uscourts.gov/
Elliot |
