Ballot Harvesting in Palm Beach County

By William J. Skinner

Harvesting ballots is a common practice in Florida and it is not strictly illegal in each and every instance.  I first became aware of the practice of planting and harvesting absentee ballots in Florida while I was researching my book: South Florida Election Law Handbook, published in 2014.  This article is a refresher to help you understand one section of the laws concerning vote-by-mail ballots and three situations that describe different ways this is done.

            Florida law (F.S. 101.62(4)(c)4) provides that individuals may request for absentee ballots for themselves and immediate family, which is defined as a spouse, child, parent, sibling, legal guardian, or grandparent. You need to read this section of the law. Florida law also requires that if one is requesting an absentee ballot for someone else, they must provide certain identifying information. A violation of this law (F.S. 104.047) constitutes a third degree felony.  Look up Florida Statutes on www.myflorida.com/floridastatutes and read the many voting methods and requirements for requesting ballots and turning them in at the time of an election in Chapter 101.  If you do not have a computer or smart phone, go to the library to use a computer.

            Over the years Florida has frequently revised its enforcement of election laws to allow certain party election workers to handle absentee ballots.  There are still several concerns.  How many ballots can be picked up from voters by candidates and delivered to the elections office?  What if the ballot collection worker represented an opponent of the voter’s choice on the ballot?  Would these ballots be delivered or tossed in the trash?  Has there been uniform enforcement of law and regulations pertaining to the details of handling these ballots? The name of these ballots has been changed to vote-by-mail ballots or mail-in ballots more recently and the word “absentee” is no longer used.

Belle Glade – 2009       This situation involved multiple political party workers in Belle Glade ordering ballots for voters and monitoring when these were delivered to the voters in 2009. Then the worker knocked on doors and tried to help the voter prepare the ballot and then take the ballot from the voter to be delivered to the election office or maybe not deliver it anywhere.  The five pages of details of the Executive Investigation conducted by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement are reviewed in the book beginning at page 292. 

            For several days, investigators tracked down voters and witnesses to try to determine what was going on.  In the end, there was no reversal of any election.  Some people lost their vote because the people who tried to help them vote probably took advantage of them.   This episode explains what investigators have to do to document a case.

Loxahatchee Groves - 2015   Loxahatchee Groves had a city election on March 10, 2015.  On that date 22 voters came to cast ballots at the only polling place and told the election officials that someone had ordered absentee ballots for them. When Keith Harris lost the city election he sued the city election board members and the Supervisor of Elections on March 26, 2015.  The case was active for over four years in the Circuit Court until a voluntary dismissal was entered on May 30, 2019 dismissing the remaining parties with Supervisor of Elections Susan Bucher being dismissed earlier.

            During the early days of this case a Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) investigation was conducted.  On the date of the election 22 individuals that appeared at the election polls in person to vote complained to an elections poll worker that they received an unsolicited absentee ballot. Their information was documented and a list of these individuals was later provided to Supervisor of Elections Susan Bucher for her review. In an effort to further the FDLE investigation, Bucher provided Special Agent (SA) Thomas a copy of the list containing the 22 individuals that appeared in person to vote on the day of the election along with copies of 153 absentee ballot request submission forms processed for the March 10th election. These forms memorialized the identity of those who absentee ballots were processed for during the time period of March 1, 2015 through March 4, 2015. These 153 forms represent a fraction of the 304 total ballots requested for this election.

            Following the interviews of several of the persons receiving the absentee ballots, the FDLE investigators concluded: “Steps taken by SA Thomas to unequivocally identify a suspect(s) or target(s) in this investigation yielded negative results, thus preventing the Office of the State Attorney from pursuing any criminal charges. According to ASA Marci Rex, a clear connection between the electronic source (computer type device) of where the request for the absentee ballots originated and its operator(s) would need to be determined in order to file and pursue a criminal conviction. A clear connection was not made in this case.”

            After this decision an effort was made by the investigators to determine the source of the devices used to request the ballots.  This led to the following conclusion in the investigative report: “In furtherance of this investigation, Special Agent (SA) D. Thomas after meeting with Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections Susan Marie Bucher, on March 12, 2015, was provided with internet protocol (IP) information for investigative purposes. Bucher requested this information from their (Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections Office) online computer website vender (SOE Software) in response to SA Thomas' request to query certain computer database logs. The information provided revealed that the identified IP address was linked to over 100 online absentee voter ballot requests for the March 2015 election. The IP address was identified as a "Dynamic Internet Protocol address". SA Thomas learned that such IP addresses were derived from a pool of IP addresses and were assigned and reassigned as individuals' devices (computers, laptops, tablets, cellular telephones, etc.) logged on and off any particular computer network. The IP address identified in this investigation could have randomly been used by any number of internet users using any number of devices during the time period the more than 100 absentee voter ballot requests were made. As such, efforts to track the specific IP address for each of the absentee ballot email requests made became unsuccessful. On April 9, 2015, at approximately 10:00 a.m., SA Thomas, in further attempts to explore the possibility of identifying the IP address information he was provided, contacted SA W. Hernandez of FDLE's Computer Cyber Technology (Cybertech) Unit. SA Thomas, after explaining the circumstances regarding the IP address in question, requested SA Hernandez to make an additional attempt to obtain any available IP identification information. SA Hernandez, on April 17, 2015, informed SA Thomas via email communication that his efforts were met with negative results and that the IP address provided came back to a ‘dead end’.”  FDLE Case Number: MI-32-0049, Serial #: 26, 11/25/2015  More information about this case can be obtained from an article “Loxahatchee Groves councilman cooperating in absentee ballot probe” by Kristen M. Clark - Palm Beach Post Staff Writer, Thursday, March 12, 2015 Source of Post article was http://www.mypalmbeachpost.com/news/local/loxahatchee-groves-councilman-cooperating-absentee-ballot-probe/eOc6HpGl8U9ZpA9UHCFwjJ/ See also Circuit Court file in the 15th Judicial Circuit in Palm Beach County, Case No.  50-2015-CA-003454-XXXX-MB

West Palm Beach – 2016  This case of ballot harvesting involved two candidates, one for state House, and one for County Commissioner.  The facts are extensive for this case and the Palm Beach Post assigned several reporters and photographers to research the election for an article published in 2017.  They reported their research at : https://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/special-reports/winning-candidates-help-voters-fill-out-their-ballots/V0ieae6VcZNNWF6I9ylRdM/.  How the Post got the story?  Main authors were:  Alexandra Seltzer and  Lulu Ramadan.  Data reporter Mike Stucka, researcher Melanie Mena and staff writer Daphne Duret also contributed to this story.

             The research team reported the votes in three precincts as a small part of their extensive coverage of these election results.

PRECINCT 7186 Boynton Beach Civic Center	PRECINCT 7196 Temple Sinai, Delray Beach	PRECINCT 7174 Rolling Green Elementary, Boynton Beach
69% of all ballots were mail-in	62% of all ballots were mail-in	55% of all ballots were mail-in
378 total mail-in ballots	366 total mail-in ballots	135 total mail-in ballots
338 voted for Bernard	310 voted for Bernard	112 voted for Bernard
334 voted for Jacquet	302 voted for Jacquet	105 voted for Jacquet
August 30, 2016	Primary Election

Here is a series of comments from the authors of this extensive special article cited above. ‘For Bernard and Jacquet, the Aug. 30 primary meant outright victory. Nobody ran against them in the November general election.

“Powell comfortably beat Republican Ron Berman in November, and in his first few weeks as a state senator has introduced a few pieces of legislation.“One of them?  “A bill to make it easier to drop off vote-by-mail ballots.”

            Powell is Bobby Powell who was elected to the Florida Senate District 30 in November of 2016.  The Senate district does not include these same three precincts. So far Powell has not been able to get an amendment to Florida statutes to make it easier to drop off vote-by-mail ballots.  See Laws of Florida 2019-162 for amendments to F.S. 101.62 in 2019.  Protect your vote, read the election laws.

            The idea of ballot harvesting is gaining strength in states like California where the legislature approved it.  Florida voters must become aware of the consequences of harvesting ballots before more elections disappear under an avalanche of one party or the other taking advantage of loop holes. But ballot harvesting is illegal in North Carolina and many other states.  A Congressional election was ordered canceled after a lengthy Federal Court battle and done over because of ballot harvesting by a Republican in the 2018 election. 

DO THE DEMS HAVE A GOD PROBLEM?

By William J. Skinner

Political campaigns bring out the best and the worst in some people.  Listeners make up their minds about political promises based on their own understanding of what the candidates are saying during the political campaigns.  Listeners evaluate whether what is said based on their own experiences and learning, including their own religion.  Whether a politician’s promise is “good” or “bad,” will be at least partly dependent upon what the listener’s beliefs are at the time the promises are made known.

            The First Amendment says “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”  The part of this amendment that deals with religion contains the “establishment clause” and the “free exercise” clause.  This clearly says government cannot make laws that affect religion.

            In 2012, the Democratic Party had a debate and a vote at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia about putting God back in their national platform and a sizeable part of the hundreds of delegates booed the result.  In the 2016 platform, “God” was named in “God-given potential” in the preamble and by inference in the section on LBTG people.  It is not clear how many times the Democratic delegates booed at what provisions in 2016.

            Democrat candidates for President in 2020 have expressed views that present religious questions.  We as individuals or voters cannot stop them from having these views, but we can ask them to clarify those views and take those views into our own account when deciding whether we want to support or vote for a candidate office.

            In an article titled, “Democrats still haven’t faced their God problem,” by Salena Zito on

March 15, 2017 in the New York Post, the author writes,

“The Democratic Party has a God problem.  And over the last couple of decades, as its base became more educated, less religious and more urban, this problem has only grown.

“Some of this has to do with lower church attendance in cities versus rural areas, and the Democratic Party’s increasing reliance on urban voters. Some of it is the divisiveness of social or cultural issues like abortion and gay marriage. And the divide has seemingly sapped Democrats’ ability to communicate to religious Americans.

“Especially if those people of faith are white, according to Brad Chism, a longtime and respected Democratic strategist based in Mississippi.

“And that problem extends to the national media, who by and large are mostly Democrats, meaning you have these powerful forces who do not understand more than half of the people in this country,” he said.

“Chism makes a crucial point about what this means for American politics: Some of the greatest moral advancements in our country’s history have been accomplished largely through the influence of the church and churchgoing people, especially through the 20th century.

“You look at women’s suffrage, civil rights, the abolition of slavery and all of these massive other changes — religion and religious people have played a role in moving society toward a higher plane,” said Chism.

“We’ve seen that recently as well, but a lot of progressives and liberal Democrats don’t see the role of religion in society, and that is a big mistake,” he said. 

See  https://nypost.com/2017/03/15/democrats-still-havent-faced-their-god-proble

In a more recent article by Caleb Parke for Fox News,, the author states,

“Political pundits said Democrats have a God problem and their latest move shows they are taking steps to solve it.

“President Trump solidified the evangelical vote in 2016 but Democrats hope to make up for the sins of Hillary Clinton's campaign, which was criticized for its lack of outreach to faith groups in the last election. The Democratic National Committee recruited a far-left religious outreach director and is launching a round of listening sessions with faith leaders leading up to the 2020 election.

“WILL TRUMP SOLIDIFY MORE CHRISTIAN VOTERS IN 2020? THIS EVANGELICAL LEADER THINKS SO

“The DNC hired former Washington, D.C. anti-Trump pastor, Rev. Derrick Harkins, who held a similar position in 2012 and has been the senior vice president of Union Theological Seminary in New York City, which recently celebrated "rejoicing in the queerness of God."

“We take seriously the relationships that we have with faith communities around this country," Harkins told Religion News Service, adding that faith "will be a priority going into 2020, but even more importantly, beyond 2020.”

“ANTI-TRUMP PROFESSOR ACCUSES GOP OF TRYING TO ‘PIMP GOD’

“Over the past few elections, Democrats have alienated themselves further from religious voters, partly in due to stances it takes on social issues like abortion and gay marriage, not to mention its focus on urban communities that tend to have lower church attendance than their rural counterparts. While Trump took 80 percent of the white evangelical vote, Democratic presidential hopefuls are gearing up for more faith outreach, especially in historically black churches and within minority communities.”

See https://www.foxnews.com/politics/2020-election-faith-democratic-party-religious-left

            The D. James Kennedy Ministries newsletter, Impact, for March 2020, discusses the Hallmark of American Freedom which is the consent of the governed. Executive Frank Wright says the progressives have refused to accept the result of the 2016 election and they are planning to steal your vote in 2020.  Wright goes on to list the Leftwing tactics they will use. 

            Starting with get rid of the electoral college, they move to spoiling the integrity of voter registrations, to manipulation of the election ballot, to risks of recounts, and with ballot harvesting.  All of these efforts will be coordinated.

            These same tactics are mentioned by the American Civil Rights Union, the Public Interest Legal Foundation, and Judicial Watch among many non-profit groups who spend some of their resources and time on protecting the consent of the governed.  The 2020 election will be a turning point for upholding the American experiment.

            It may help to know the difference from right and wrong.  Do you?  Are you supporting the efforts of these groups or ignoring them?

TOXICITY TO HUMANS

FROM ALGAE BLOOMS IN FLORIDA

By William J. Skinner

Algae blooms in Lake Okeechobee, St. Lucie River and the Caloosahatchee River have been making the news for years in middle and south Florida.  People complain about the smell, dead fish, and the green guacamole goo that covers rocks, sand beaches, and boats tied to docks.  The complaints are responded to by Governor Declarations of warnings[1], court cases up to the 11^th Circuit against the operators of the Lake Okeechobee discharges[2], and by state and federal research projects to study what is going on.  But there is no resolution of the problem within sight for humans who want good health and depend on clean water or for businesses that earn money in fishing, recreation, and tourism.

            Algae or cyanobacteria are single cell organisms that have existed for millions of years on earth. The algae at question is called by several names.  Governor Scott’s Executive Order in 2016 called the algae “mycrocystis.”  “Microcystis is a genus of freshwater cyanobacteria which includes the harmful algal bloom Microcystis aeruginosa. The cyanobacteria can produce neurotoxins and hepatotoxins, such as microcystin and cyanopeptolin,” according to Wikipedia.com.[3]  See also[4]

            Researchers have called one of the toxins found in cyanobacteria blooms, BMAA (Beta-Methylamino-L-alanine).[5] Other more recently researchers say the toxin is a protein, alpha-Synuclein (αS), formed from norovirus infections in the gut.  “But too much αS — such as from multiple or chronic infections — becomes toxic because the system that disposes of αS is overwhelmed, nerves are damaged by the toxic aggregates that form and chronic inflammation ensues. Damage occurs both within the nervous system of the GI tract and the brain,” says Michael Zasloff, MD, PhD, professor of surgery and pediatrics at Georgetown University School of Medicine and scientific director of the MedStar Georgetown Transplant Institute.”[6] “Zasloff and his colleagues studied biopsy samples, collected at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, from 42 children with upper GI distress. They also looked at another population of 14 MedStar Georgetown University Hospital patients who received an intestinal transplant. This second group had documented cases of infection by Norovirus, a common cause of upper GI infection.”[7]

            So what happens to the brains of those who have the toxin?  To summarize quickly, I will quote Jon Palfreman, a medical documentary maker and Parkinson’s Disease patient, whose 2015 book brings up to date the various research strands.  He says “There’s a scientific consensus that once about 70 percent of dopamine-making cells in the substantia nigra die, the clinical symptoms of Parkinson’s kick in.  If everybody lived to be 120, then everybody would be hit with threshold just by aging.  But some individuals hit the threshold earlier and manifest symptoms – many, like me around sixty years old and some, much earlier.  In this case, other sources of cell death – genetic mutations or environmental toxins, for example – are likely involved in the decline in the reservoir of dopamine producing neurons.  And as the dopamine cells keep dying, the symptoms associated with Parkinson’s get worse and worse.”[8]

            Neurotoxins are toxic to the nerve system and brain.  Hepatotoxins are toxic to the liver. The toxins get into the body by drinking, eating or breathing, maybe swimming in a broader sense.  These toxins do not affect everybody.  Medical scientists are discovering the route to the brain is from the stomach in some cases.  Persons who have given their bodies to medical science for research have toxins in the brain.

             In 1999 the Florida legislature passed F.S. 379.2271-Harmful-Algal-Bloom (HAB) Task Force Act[9] and made an effort to fund some research for a short time.  There were no dissenting votes for this bill indicating there was no public disagreement with studying the problem.  Congress got involved at some point and made a federal case for research by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.[10]  At NOAA you will find HABs occurred all across the United States from the California coast to Lake Erie to New England and Florida.  Several other bacteria are implicated in these report studies.

          Florida officials assigned research tasks to three agencies -- Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the South Florida Water Management District to prepare a report titled, Lake Okeechobee Protection Plan (LOPP).  The last such report is dated March 2011.[11]  This 463 page report has one page on algae blooms covering the period from May 2004 to November 2009.  The hurricanes of 2004 and 2005 created HABs.

            The report authors claim “This document fulfills the requirement for a three-year update of the Lake Okeechobee Protection Plan (LOPP). It focuses on the progress of the three Coordinating Agencies in reducing phosphorus loads consistent with the Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL)1 established for the lake as well as increasing storage to achieve healthier lake levels and reduce harmful discharges to the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie estuaries. The document provides (1) an introduction detailing the purpose of the LOPP Update, legislative requirements, and a description of the Lake Okeechobee Watershed; (2) an overview of the Lake Okeechobee Protection Program, including a description of its components; (3) information on the current status of Lake Okeechobee; (4) challenges in the watershed; (5) a review of past and current activities with summaries of completed and ongoing projects and activities; and (6) strategies for moving forward to reduce phosphorus loads to the lake and increase storage, including funding requirements over the next three years, and other project planning elements.”[12] [footnote omitted.]

             This report appears to be the last LOPP update in this format as new report labels are now being applied to similar group of program reports.

             Since the 11^th Circuit Court of Appeals did not rule on the merits of the conservation organizations’ claims in its June 19, 2017 decision, although the suit was pending since it was filed in 2012, the organizations are contemplating what to do next.  A review of their websites in July 4, 2017 found no mentions of this court decision or any plans for next steps.

             The Palm Beach Post on July 3, 2017 in an article titled “Scott sees Lake O dike fix as algae solution” by Joel Engelhardt mentioned several points.  The article updates Florida Governor Rick Scott’s efforts to obtain federal money to complete repairs to the Lake O dike by 2022 at a cumulative total of $922 million.    Interest groups disagree on whether this expenditure will solve the problems.  The U. S. Army Corps of Engineers says it must do a two or three year study to determine whether the water level in the dike can be raised if all the work is completed. 

            Congress appropriated $765 million for repairs during the Obama years.  Still to be done are 35 miles of seepage barrier and eight more culverts.  The Florida legislature in May 2017 at a special session appropriated $50 million for reservoir construction to take the water storage problem off of the Lake O dike.  Scott had asked for $200 million for a 60,000 acre reservoir, but this is shrunk to 17,000 acres with the smaller appropriation.  The corporate sugar farmers and several smaller farmers objected to the 60,000 acre project as it would reduce jobs and crops. The current Trump Administration budget has only $82 million in it now, less than half of the $200 million per year needed to complete the dike repairs.

            What I have tried to place before you for consideration is the serious danger that some of you and your families are facing by living where HABs occur more and more frequently.  I provide sources for a variety of important information points on this subject. Water is becoming a critical health and safety problem that cries out for sensible and workable solutions that can be obtained only with great political skill. 

             Do we have any Republican politicians who can define and accomplish what needs to be done?  Will any of them be elected to Congress in 2018?  Who are they and when will they file to be on the ballot?

             This article first appeared in the July 2017 newsletter of the Palm Beach County Republican Party. Mr. Skinner is a retired pharmacist and attorney.

---

[1] Florida Governor Executive Order 16-155, June 29, 2016

[2]Florida Wildlife Mgmt, et al v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineer, 11^th Circuit Court of Appeals – June 19, 2017, Case No. 4:12-cv-00355.  Case dismissed under Federal Rule 19(b) for failure to join SFWMD in the suit.

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microcystis,  Accessed July 2, 2017

[4] https://www.epa.gov/nutrient-policy-data/cyanobacteriacyanotoxins. Accessed July 6, 2017

[5] Paul Allen Cox, Ph.D. at Jackson Hole in TEDx talks. Oct. 31, 2012, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jWi6WQQ9wo

[6] Protein Associated with Parkinson’s Disease Linked to Human Upper GI Tract Infections, http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/676760/?sc=mwhr&xy=5040626.  Accessed June 27, 2017

[7] Ibid.

[8] Brain Storms: The Race to Unlock the Mysteries of Parkinson’s Disease, 2015, Jon Palfreman, Scientific American, 128, ISBN:  978-0-374-71185-0

[9] CS/2^ND ENG/SB 2038 passed the Senate on April 23, 1999 by a vote of 38-0. The bill then passed the House with one $3 million appropriations amendment on April 28, 1999 by a vote of 114-0, and the Senate concurred on April 29, 1999 by a vote of 9-0.  The Governor approved the bill on May 18, 1999, and designated Chapter No. 99-185.  The money was to be used for research by the Florida Marine Research Institute.

[10] For a 26 page list of NOAA reports on Harmful Algae Blooms (“HAB”), see https://search.usa.gov/search?affiliate=noaa.gov&commit=&page=24&query=harmful+Algal+Blooms&utf8=%E2%9C%93

[11] http://myfrontallobe.com/lopp_update_2011_3.pdf, Accessed July 1, 2017 

[12] Lake Okeechobee Protection Plan Update 2011, page 1,  https://sfwmd.gov/portal/page/portal/xrepository/sfwmd_repository_pdf/lopp_update_2011_ex_sum.pdf, Accessed July 2, 2017

SUPREME COURT RULES FEDERAL COURTS

 CANNOT DECIDE GERRYMANDERING CASES

by William J. Skinner

The state legislatures in Maryland and North Carolina will be glad to know that only state courts can now decide redistricting cases concerning Federal elections, a decision issued June 27, 2019 by the Supreme Court of the United States in Rucho, et al. v. Common Cause, et al., No. 18–422,  the North Carolina case. Together with No. 18–726, Lamone et al. v. Benisek et al., on appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, redistricting that favors one political party over another has been a longstanding matter of contention, but the Court declared it has run out of any arguments that it can agree on to assume it has jurisdiction to decide these cases.  In effect, the Supreme Court says it cannot resolve these political cases in that court house.

            The Court Syllabus in Rucho, below, is a summary of how the Court got the case and its interpretation and is reproduced here as an aid to understanding the decision:

 Voters and other plaintiffs in North Carolina and Maryland filed suits challenging their States’ congressional districting maps as unconsti­tutional partisan gerrymanders. The North Carolina plaintiffs claimed that the State’s districting plan discriminated against Demo­crats, while the Maryland plaintiffs claimed that their State’s plan discriminated against Republicans. The plaintiffs alleged violations of the First Amendment, the Equal Protection Clause of the Four­teenth Amendment, the Elections Clause, and Article I, §2. The Dis­trict Courts in both cases ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, and the de­fendants appealed directly to this Court.

Held: Partisan gerrymandering claims present political questions be­yond the reach of the federal courts. Pp. 6–34.

(a) In these cases, the Court is asked to decide an important ques­tion of constitutional law. Before it does so, the Court “must find that the question is presented in a ‘case’ or ‘controversy’ that is . . . ‘of a Judiciary Nature.’ ” DaimlerChrysler Corp. v. Cuno, 547 U. S. 332, 342. While it is “the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is,” Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 177, some­times the law is that the Judiciary cannot entertain a claim because it presents a nonjusticiable “political question,” Baker v. Carr, 369 U. S. 186, 217. Among the political question cases this Court has identified are those that lack “judicially discoverable and manageable standards for resolving [them].” Ibid. This Court’s partisan gerry­mandering cases have left unresolved the question whether such claims are claims of legal right, resolvable according to legal principles, or political questions that must find their resolution elsewhere. See Gill v. Whitford, 585 U. S. ___, ___.  

Partisan gerrymandering was known in the Colonies prior to Inde­pendence, and the Framers were familiar with it at the time of the drafting and ratification of the Constitution. They addressed the election of Representatives to Congress in the Elections Clause, Art. I, §4, cl. 1, assigning to state legislatures the power to prescribe the “Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections” for Members of Congress, while giving Congress the power to “make or alter” any such regulations. Congress has regularly exercised its Elections Clause power, including to address partisan gerrymandering. But the Framers did not set aside all electoral issues as questions that only Congress can resolve. In two areas—one-person, one-vote and racial gerrymandering—this Court has held that there is a role for the courts with respect to at least some issues that could arise from a State’s drawing of congressional districts. But the history of partisan gerrymandering is not irrelevant. Aware of electoral districting prob­lems, the Framers chose a characteristic approach, assigning the is­sue to the state legislatures, expressly checked and balanced by the Federal Congress, with no suggestion that the federal courts had a role to play.

Courts have nonetheless been called upon to resolve a variety of questions surrounding districting. The claim of population inequality among districts in Baker v. Carr, for example, could be decided under basic equal protection principles. 369 U. S., at 226. Racial discrimi­nation in districting also raises constitutional issues that can be ad­dressed by the federal courts. See Gomillion v. Lightfoot, 364 U. S. 339, 340. Partisan gerrymandering claims have proved far more dif­ficult to adjudicate, in part because “a jurisdiction may engage in constitutional political gerrymandering.” Hunt v. Cromartie, 526 U. S. 541, 551. To hold that legislators cannot take their partisan in­terests into account when drawing district lines would essentially countermand the Framers’ decision to entrust districting to political entities. The “central problem” is “determining when political ger­rymandering has gone too far.” Vieth v. Jubelirer, 541 U. S. 267, 296 (plurality opinion). Despite considerable efforts in Gaffney v. Cum­mings, 412 U. S. 735, 753; Davis v. Bandemer, 478 U. S. 109, 116– 117; Vieth, 541 U. S., at 272–273; and League of United Latin Ameri­can Citizens v. Perry, 548 U. S. 399, 414 (LULAC), this Court’s prior cases have left “unresolved whether . . . claims [of legal right] may be brought in cases involving allegations of partisan gerrymandering,” Gill, 585 U. S., at ___. Two “threshold questions” remained: stand­ing, which was addressed in Gill, and “whether [such] claims are jus­ticiable.” Ibid. Pp. 6–14.

(b)  Any standard for resolving partisan gerrymandering claims must be grounded in a “limited and precise rationale” and be “clear, manageable, and politically neutral.” Vieth, 541 U. S., at 306–308 (Kennedy, J., concurring in judgment). The question is one of degree: How to “provid[e] a standard for deciding how much partisan dominance is too much.” LULAC, 548 U. S., at 420 (opinion of Kennedy, J.). Partisan gerrymandering claims rest on an instinct that groups with a certain level of political support should enjoy a commensurate level of political power and influence. Such claims invariably sound in a desire for proportional representation, but the Constitution does not require proportional representation, and federal courts are neither equipped nor authorized to apportion political power as a matter of fairness. It is not even clear what fairness looks like in this context. It may mean achieving a greater number of competitive districts by undoing packing and cracking so that supporters of the disadvantaged party have a better shot at electing their preferred candidates. But it could mean engaging in cracking and packing to ensure each party its “appropriate” share of “safe” seats. Or perhaps it should be measured by adherence to “traditional” districting criteria. Deciding among those different visions of fairness poses basic questions that are political, not legal. There are no legal standards discernible in the Constitution for making such judgments. And it is only after determining how to define fairness that one can even begin to answer the determinative question: “How much is too much?”

The fact that the Court can adjudicate one-person, one-vote claims does not mean that partisan gerrymandering claims are justiciable. This Court’s one-person, one-vote cases recognize that each person is entitled to an equal say in the election of representatives. It hardly follows from that principle that a person is entitled to have his political party achieve representation commensurate to its share of statewide support. Vote dilution in the one-person, one-vote cases refers to the idea that each vote must carry equal weight. That requirement does not extend to political parties; it does not mean that each party must be influential in proportion to the number of its supporters. The racial gerrymandering cases are also inapposite: They call for the elimination of a racial classification, but a partisan gerrymandering claim cannot ask for the elimination of partisanship. Pp. 15–21.

(c) None of the proposed “tests” for evaluating partisan gerrymandering claims meets the need for a limited and precise standard that is judicially discernible and manageable. Pp. 22–30.

(1) The Common Cause District Court concluded that all but one of the districts in North Carolina’s 2016 Plan violated the Equal Protection Clause by intentionally diluting the voting strength of Democrats. It applied a three-part test, examining intent, effects, and cau­sation. The District Court’s “predominant intent” prong is borrowed from the test used in racial gerrymandering cases. However, unlike race-based decision making, which is “inherently suspect,” Miller v. Johnson, 515 U. S. 900, 915, districting for some level of partisan ad­vantage is not unconstitutional. Determining that lines were drawn on the basis of partisanship does not indicate that districting was constitutionally impermissible. The Common Cause District Court also required the plaintiffs to show that vote dilution is “likely to per­sist” to such a degree that the elected representatives will feel free to ignore the concerns of the supporters of the minority party. Experi­ence proves that accurately predicting electoral outcomes is not sim­ple, and asking judges to predict how a particular districting map will perform in future elections risks basing constitutional holdings on unstable ground outside judicial expertise. The District Court’s third prong—which gave the defendants an opportunity to show that discriminatory effects were due to a “legitimate redistricting objec­tive”—just restates the question asked at the “predominant intent” prong. Pp. 22–25.

(2) The District Courts also found partisan gerrymandering claims justiciable under the First Amendment, coalescing around a basic three-part test: proof of intent to burden individuals based on their voting history or party affiliation, an actual burden on political speech or associational rights, and a causal link between the invidi­ous intent and actual burden. But their analysis offers no “clear” and “manageable” way of distinguishing permissible from impermissible partisan motivation. Pp. 25–27.

(3) Using a State’s own districting criteria as a baseline from which to measure how extreme a partisan gerrymander is would be indeterminate and arbitrary. Doing so would still leave open the question of how much political motivation and effect is too much. Pp. 27–29.

(4) The North Carolina District Court further held that the 2016 Plan violated Article I, §2, and the Elections Clause, Art. I, §4, cl. 1. But the Vieth plurality concluded—without objection from any other Justice—that neither §2 nor §4 “provides a judicially enforceable limit on the political considerations that the States and Congress may take into account when districting.” 541 U. S., at 305. Any assertion that partisan gerrymanders violate the core right of voters to choose their representatives is an objection more likely grounded in the Guarantee Clause of Article IV, §4, which “guarantee[s] to every State in [the] Union a Republican Form of Government.” This Court has several times concluded that the Guarantee Clause does not pro­vide the basis for a justiciable claim. See, e.g., Pacific States Tele­phone & Telegraph Co. v. Oregon, 223 U. S. 118. Pp. 29–30.

(d) The conclusion that partisan gerrymandering claims are not justiciable neither condones excessive partisan gerrymandering nor condemns complaints about districting to echo into a void. Numerous States are actively addressing the issue through state constitutional amendments and legislation placing power to draw electoral districts in the hands of independent commissions, mandating particular dis­tricting criteria for their mapmakers, or prohibiting drawing district lines for partisan advantage. The Framers also gave Congress the

power to do something about partisan gerrymandering in the Elec­tions Clause. That avenue for reform established by the Framers, and used by Congress in the past, remains open. Pp. 30–34.

318 F. Supp. 3d 777 and 348 F. Supp. 3d 493, vacated and remanded.

ROBERTS, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which THOMAS, ALITO, GORSUCH, and KAVANAUGH, JJ., joined. KAGAN, J., filed a dis­senting opinion, in which GINSBURG, BREYER, and SOTOMAYOR, JJ., joined.

            The opinion language follows the Synopsis which has no standing like the opinion.  The entire opinion is 72 pages and may be found at: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/18pdf/18-422_9ol1.pdf  This case will be a matter of contention in many future gerrymandering cases.  This is important because state courts will be able to decide district lines until some new legal arguments are dreamed up by challengers.

            As state legislative redistricting cases go, Florida had recently ping ponged cases         through the state court system with judges helping to write the lines that describe the state House and Senate boundaries.  We can probably expect more of these cases to come up after the 2020 Census.  There is time for constitutional and statutory remedies to be suggested now if we want to get ahead of the process.

            After the 1990 Census, the author participated in a Maryland case titled Legislative Redistricting Cases in Maryland, 331 Md 574, 629 A.2d 646 (1993).  He filed a legal challenge to Governor William Donald Schaefer’s Redistricting Advisory Committee’s plan filed under Maryland’s Constitution and laws.  There were six other challenger interests.  I represented Sidney Weiner and myself as residents of Montgomery County, a jurisdiction similar in size and political composition as Palm Beach County.  Weiner was a Republican with a Ph.D. in statistics who helped me frame part of our arguments.  Our case was filed as Miscellaneous No. 17 in the Court of Appeals that were heard by a Special Master, a retired Court of Appeals Judge. The filings and hearing transcripts were then provided to the judges.  Our arguments were that the Governor’s plan 1) violated the “due regard” provision requiring that natural boundaries and political subdivision be given notice; 2) the plan create districts of unequal population; 3) that the plan violates First Amendment Rights; and 4) that the plan did not comprehensively describe the districts it establishes.  This case was about state legislative districts, not Congressional districts.  The Maryland process resulted in Congressional Districts that varied as little as 12 votes to up to 10 percent under the one man, one vote rules.  But Maryland could not find a way to make state districts of 100,000 voters any closer than 10,000 votes each. The final opinion came out on August 24, 1993 and consumed more than two years in the process.

            Some public commentator opined that the statistical arguments about First Amendment rights caused the Court of Appeals (Maryland’s top court) to go to the precipice or edge of the cliff, but they did not fall over the side.  The First Amendment arguments used in the1993 decision in Maryland were picked up by attorneys in several more recent cases in other states, but these have not worked there either.  In the 32 years I lived in Maryland the state only gained a Republican governor the year we moved to Florida and since then a second Republican, Larry Hogan, was elected governor.

            The majority party in Maryland continues to be the Democratic Party in 2019. The Democrats have 2.2 million, the Republicans have 1 million and the total number of voters is 4 million. In North Carolina, there are now 6.7 million voters including 2.5 million Democrats, 2 million Republicans, and 2.2 million unaffiliated voters.

            Florida as of June 30, 2019 has 13.4 million voters including 4.7 million Republicans, and 4.9 million Democrats. Florida has new leadership in the executive branch and the Supreme Court.  Republicans still control the House and Senate. The future depends on how the parties’ are credited by the voters between now and the 2020 elections.  

Skinner retired to Florida in 2003 and was first elected to the Republican Executive Committee in that year. [Photo]