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Modern data-driven map making capabilities have made the age-old practice of drawing congressional districts to favor a political party – gerrymandering – a frighteningly precise and effective weapon in American politics.A SCOTUS punt of two high-profile cases that were before the Supreme Court this summer (one an example of Republican partisan gerrymandering, the other Democratic) led to citizen ballot initiatives in several states, while just this week in North Carolina, a federal court ruled

Sacramento, CA.- Two years ago, nearly two-thirds of California voters supported a ballot measure to crack down on legislative trickery. For decades, state lawmakers had dodged the public by secretly drafting important bills and then quickly jamming them through both legislative houses. They became known as “mushroom bills” because they sprouted in the dark of night. Proposition 54, backed by a wide array of civic groups and with $10.7 million in campaign financing from wealthy Stanford Univer

In a move that many believe will disenfranchise third party, independent, and even Republican candidates in the majority-Democratic state of New Mexico, the NM Secretary of State, Maggie Toulouse Oliver, announced Wednesday that she will include a "straight party" voting option for the 2018 general election ballot. Straight party, or "straight ticket" voting, which was discontinued in New Mexico in 2012 by then-Secretary of State Dianna Duran, is a ballot option that allows voters to simply pic

San Diego, CA.-Drawing parallels to the New Jersey Bridgegate scandal, supporters of the "Yes on 6" effort to repeal the Gas Tax Measure in California, have sent letters to to three agencies urging the filing of criminal charges against Caltrans for appearing to hand out "No on 6" campaign materials to motorists while traffic was stopped on the 78. California state law prohibits the use of taxpayer money to engage in a political campaign. Caught On Tape Here is the YouTube video the campaign

Nick Brana, who was the national political outreach coordinator for Bernie Sanders' 2016 campaign and I had an extensive conversation looking ahead to 2020. Brana and I talked about the new DNC rules passed over the weekend, but we also discussed Bernie in 2020 and his current standing with independent voters. Listen to the full interview here. The DNC passed new rules for 2020 that institute a party purity test for presidential candidates, bar superdelegates from voting on the first president

It has been a long hot summer in the war of the paper ballots in Georgia. The Secretary of State Brian Kemp is set to face off with plaintiffs on September 12th in oral arguments over a lawsuit accusing his office of inadequately addressing weaknesses in Georgia's voting system. The group of voting rights activists who filed suit in Curling v. Kemp requested a preliminary injunction to block the state’s use of 27,000 AccuVote TS and AccuVote TSX voting machines in the upcoming November election

FARGO, N.D. - Fargo, North Dakota may soon make history. City voters will decide in November whether or not it will become the first jurisdiction in the US to adopt Approval Voting -- an alternative voting method that allows voters to choose as many candidates on the ballot as they want. The nonpartisan group, Reform Fargo, submitted approximately 2,000 signatures to get Approval Voting on the November ballot, about 600 more than the group needed. The signatures were officially certified this w

We’ve all been sufficiently frustrated by the gap between the values someone espouses and the policies they support that we’ve gotten into political arguments to help them see their error. Perhaps, if we’re more honest about our own motivation, we just reacted to get rid of that visceral dissonant feeling that “something that wrong just can’t be allowed to stand.” And no doubt, whenever you do that, you lay out a clear, fact-based, logically consistent case for the correct view. You’ve probabl

While viewing a map of congressional districts, one may believe they are examining an unsolvable puzzle. The same type of puzzle where you dump thousands of tiny colored pieces out of a box onto your kitchen table and immediately realize you have a bad case of buyer’s remorse. Similarly, on the district map, small jagged lines paired with long shapes seem to stretch through and around counties in a way that can best be described as completely unconventional. These shapes have come about as a re

San Diego, CA.- From the Oval Office, President Trump announced a new trade deal with Mexico. The deal was announced as a conference call with the President of Mexico, Enrique Peña Nieto. The deal is expected to be called the United States-Mexico Trade Agreement. Peña Nieto noted in the conference call, "We think this is something very positive for the U.S. and Mexico, we are celebrating the negotiating between our two countries. It's been a negotiation for quite a few months, to review, mode