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A woman I know sent me a note the other day. I was surprised, but happy to hear from her as we don’t know each other well. In the note, she explained that she had woken up last Monday morning to the news of the Las Vegas shootings. While preparing lunches for her boys to take to school, she wondered whether to tell them what had happened before they started their day. She decided to tell them — better to hear it from her than in the school hallways. Her note touched me, in part because she'd w

Should lawmakers be allowed to draw electoral districts to protect their party from competition? Can the courts rule legislative and congressional maps unconstitutional on the basis of partisan and political discrimination? Those are among the questions the Supreme Court is considering in the case Gill v. Whitford. To give you a brief overview, Gill v. Whitford is a partisan gerrymandering case out of Wisconsin in which a group of Democratic voters are challenging legislative districts drawn b

Update October 3, 2017: The full transcript has been released for the oral argument in Gill v. Whitford. Check out the transcript below. The Supreme Court heard oral argument Tuesday in Gill v. Whitford, a case out of Wisconsin that challenges the state's gerrymandered legislative districts. Gill v. Whitford is significant because it is the first case that a federal court ruled electoral maps unconstitutional not on the basis of race or class discrimination, but political discrimination. The d

WAR GAMES The US and South Korea will continue with their plans of 10 days worth of military exercises beginning today, despite dire warning from North Korea. The Ulchi Freedom Guardian military exercises are designed to test the readiness of South Korea and the United States, should conflict with the north break out. North Korea warned yesterday that the military exercises are "reckless behavior driving the situation into the uncontrollable phase of a nuclear war." In messages printed by the

Is it uncivilized for a society with the power to save someone to let them die? Australia, Germany, Canada, France, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom are only a few of the world leaders where a person is eligible for basic care regardless of their financial situation. In the United States, however, we all-too-often see the consequences of citizens that can’t afford to pay for a doctor. Say what you will about the importance of the free market, say what you will about how the United States is

"A cancer on our democracy." Those are the words U.S. District Judge James K. Bredar used to describe the two-party gerrymandering scheme going on in Maryland and across the country. A US district court sided with GOP voters Friday, describing Maryland's redistricting process as "nefarious activity." They found sufficient evidence that the Democratic majority drew district boundaries to make it easier to knock out a GOP incumbent and take all, but one congressional seat. It is the second time

The biggest headline this week on President Donald Trump's election integrity commission is that 44 states plus DC have partly or fully rejected the commission's request for a broad array of personal voter data if it is publicly available per state law. Source: NBCNews.com Source: Forbes Source: Vox From the headlines alone, this seems like a major, bipartisan rejection of the commission's request for personal voter data. Except, the headlines are a bit misleading. Here is what you need to

The fight against gerrymandering nationwide is taking a new turn. Courts are no longer just looking at discrimination based on race, sex, or class, but political discrimination and partisan motives to consolidate power and weaken the voice of voters outside the party in power. First it was Wisconsin. Then it was Pennsylvania. Now, more states are open to legal challenges against partisan gerrymandering thanks to the "efficiency gap," the statistical method used in Whitford v. Gill to determine

Pennsylvania is the latest battleground over the issue of partisan gerrymandering. Several plaintiffs filed a lawsuit Thursday challenging congressional maps drawn by the Republican-controlled Pennsylvania General Assembly that are "so bizarrely engineered that the only fair inference is that the Republican mapmakers made them so for partisan advantage." What is unique about this lawsuit is that the plaintiffs are not making a constitutional challenge based on race, sex, or any other class. Th

Progressive politicians and pundits are collectively celebrating the Supreme Court's ruling that North Carolina illegally used racial gerrymandering to draw its congressional districts. But even author and journalist Greg Palast says those celebrating need to pump the brakes a little. He first prefaced his statement. "It was a good decision one way in that it defeated the idea of dumping every black person into a single congressional district," said Palast. The bad news, Palast believes, is th