Free Republic

TALLAHASSEE — A federal judge reluctantly closed the door on allegations that key parts of a 2021 Florida elections law were unconstitutional after an appeal court overruled him on the issue. Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker issued an order after the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last year overturned a ruling in which he found the law improperly discriminated against Black voters. The Atlanta-based appeals court sent the case back to Walker to address two major issues. Walker, in his order Thursday, criticized the appeals court for “reweighing” facts in the case. But he entered a judgment in...

A full federal appeals court declined to take up Democrat groups’ challenge of Florida’s 2021 election integrity law on Thursday, marking a major win for Gov. Ron DeSantis and the GOP-controlled state legislature. According to the Orlando Sentinel, Thursday’s decision by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals “let stand an April ruling by a three-judge panel of the [court] that sided with the state on major issues in the case.” The 11th Circuit’s April decision effectively overturned a prior ruling issued by U.S. District Judge Mark Walker — an Obama appointee — who baselessly claimed the law in question discriminated...

Florida Democrats say they’re spending and organizing to chase down people who vote by mail after election officials across the state canceled all standing mail ballot requests this year. The mass cancellations were to comply with a 2021 election law that added new restrictions to mail-in voting. The legislation — which was celebrated by Gov. Ron DeSantis and slammed by voting rights advocates as discriminatory — cut the duration of mail-in ballot requests in half from four years to two. It also required that existing requests for mail ballots be canceled at the end of 2022, forcing election workers to...

Former President Donald Trump is garnering majority support in the hypothetical North Carolina 2024 Republican primary race, a John Locke Foundation survey released this week found. Like virtually every national survey, this state-level survey found Trump leading the Republican primary field with majority support, garnering support from 55 percent of likely GOP voters in North Carolina. No other potential challenger came close, as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis fell 33 points behind, with 22 percent support. Former Vice President Mike Pence placed third with eight percent, followed by former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley — who officially declared her candidacy in...

On Thursday, a panel of the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals handed Florida Governor a huge victory over Marc Elias, judicial overreach, and industrial strength stupidity. By a 2-1 decision, an Obama judge dissenting, the panel upheld nearly all of Florida’s overhaul of voting rules in May 2021. I would call it controversial, but it was only controversial to people whose lives depend upon supporting vote fraud. In May 2021, the Florida legislature passed a major overhaul of state election law. The law’s goals were to make elections more transparent and trustworthy while outlawing known abuses of the system,...

A trio of federal appellate judges upheld a prior legal ruling on Thursday that bars the state of Florida from enforcing the ‘Stop WOKE Act’ while it faces ongoing legal battles related to its constitutionality. The measure, supported by Gov. Ron DeSantis, imposes restrictions on the instruction of race-related concepts in Florida’s public universities. The decision affirmed a ruling ordered by Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker last year, where he granted a preliminary injunction against the legislation, finding that it violated First Amendment rights. “Neither the state of Florida’s authority to regulate public school curriculum nor its interest in...

A federal judge ruled that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration did not violate a court order regarding the state’s "Stop WOKE Act," which prohibits colleges from promoting critical race theory lessons and targets other "woke" concepts prevalent on higher education campuses. "Although this court would not hesitate to compel compliance with its preliminary injunction, this court finds there has been no violation of the injunction at this time," U.S. District Judge Mark E. Walker wrote on Thursday, according to the Orlando Sentinel. Plaintiffs had challenged the law, known as the "Stop Wrongs To Our Kids and Employees Act" or "Stop...

Democrats are waging lawfare to try and slow down Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Now these leftists scored a huge win. And Ron DeSantis was defeated when a judge’s ruling dealt him this major setback. Democrats are utilizing the same strategy to thwart Governor DeSantis’ agenda that they did with Donald Trump. Judge-shop until you find a friendly left-wing judge who will issue preliminary injunctions blocking key agenda items. Even if you lose on appeal, it generates headlines in the press that allows leftists to claim DeSantis is some kind of rogue executive. That’s exactly what happened when U.S. District Court...

A federal judge appointed by former President Barack Obama faced backlash this week for issuing a preliminary injunction against a law signed by Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis that targets woke indoctrination in higher education. Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker issued the ruling Thursday against the “Stop Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees (W.O.K.E.) Act,” officially dubbed the Individual Freedom Act. The judge’s move means that the law cannot be enforced on college campuses for now. “The law officially bans professors from expressing disfavored viewpoints in university classrooms while permitting unfettered expression of the opposite viewpoints,” Walker wrote in...

TALLAHASSEE — Calling the state’s approach “positively dystopian,” a federal judge on Thursday blocked a law championed by Gov. Ron DeSantis that restricts the way race-related concepts can be taught in universities. The law is “antithetical to academic freedom and has cast a leaden pall of orthodoxy over Florida’s state universities,” Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker wrote in the 139-page ruling. “Neither the state of Florida’s authority to regulate public school curriculum, nor its interest in preventing race or sex discrimination can support its weight. Nor does the First Amendment tolerate it,” he added. DeSantis’ administration quickly said it...

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — A federal judge in Florida on Thursday blocked a law pushed by Gov. Ron DeSantis that restricts certain race-based conversations and analysis in colleges. Tallahassee U.S. District Judge Mark Walker issued a temporary injunction against the so-called “Stop Woke” act in a ruling that called the legislation “positively dystopian.” The law prohibits teaching or business practices that contend members of one ethnic group are inherently racist and should feel guilt for past actions committed by others. It also bars the notion that a person’s status as privileged or oppressed is necessarily determined by their race or...

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — A Florida judge on Thursday declared a Florida law championed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis that restricts race-based conversation and analysis in business and education unconstitutional. Tallahassee U.S. District Judge Mark Walker said in a 44-page ruling that the “Stop WOKE” act violates the First Amendment and is impermissibly vague. Walker also refused to issue a stay that would keep the law in effect during any appeal by the state. The law targets what DeSantis has called a “pernicious” ideology exemplified by critical race theory — the idea that racism is systemic in U.S. institutions...

U.S. Rep. Ted Budd, a Republican backed by former President Donald Trump in North Carolina’s Senate race, is pulling ahead of other GOP candidates in the polls for retiring Sen. Richard Burr’s seat. The Raleigh News & Observer reported Sunday that Budd, a Davie County native, is leading by the double digits in the polls ahead of former Gov. Pat McCrory, former U.S. Rep. Mark Walker and political newcomer Marjorie Eastman. He has skipped debates, strategizing to instead rely on campaign events and millions of dollars in advertisements to resonate with voters and secure the party ticket. The influential conservative...

U.S. District Judge Mark Walker wrote a 288-page decision justifying his ruling that Florida’s recently enacted election integrity reforms are unconstitutional. The chief offending sections of the law included provisions to ensure the security of drop boxes, provisions to restrict bribing voters waiting in line at the polls, and regulations imposed on voter registration groups. Walker contends that “limiting the placement of drop boxes to locations where the chain-of-custody can be continuously maintained is racist. Many racial minorities fear entering public buildings because of prior negative interactions with police, incarceration, or the slavery suffered by their forebears. To offset these...

U.S. District Judge Mark Walker ruled that portions of the law restricting the use of ballot drop-boxes, assistance for voters, and third-party voter registration drives violated the Voting Rights Act and constitutional protections because they were passed "with the intent to discriminate against Black voters."

Quite a blockbuster ruling from the federal district court. The court found that in enacting certain election laws limiting registration outreach and the use of drop boxes, Florida violated the Voting Rights Act. The court also found that Florida acted intentionally discriminating against the state’s black voters. And although the parties hardly briefed it, the Court imposed a very strong remedy of requiring that certain changes in voting rules in Florida be precleared before the court for a period of 10 years under section 3c of the Voting Rights Act.

New campaign filings show North Carolina U.S. Rep. Ted Budd brought in more money during the final three months of 2021 than his opponents in his bid for the Republican Party’s U.S. Senate nomination. It’s the first time since both candidates entered the race in April that Budd has reported raising more money than former Gov. Pat McCrory, his top competitor. Budd’s campaign on Monday reported raising more than $968,000 during the period ending Dec. 31, according to a Federal Election Commission filing. McCrory took in more than $748,000. Campaign finance filings are an indicator of a candidate’s strength and...

Former Rep. Mark Walker announced Thursday that he will stay in the North Carolina Senate race, bucking pressure to drop out and run for the House instead. “The last 45 days have been a whirlwind,” Walker said, according to The News & Observer. “When we stepped away from Congress, it was in our hearts to run across North Carolina to be able to take what we’ve been able to do in central North Carolina, and take it across the state for the U.S. Senate.”

TALLAHASSEE — A legal showdown over a controversial state elections law is set to take place next month, after a federal judge rejected efforts to short-circuit a trial in constitutional challenges by voting-rights groups. The League of Women Voters of Florida, the Florida Conference of the NAACP, Disability Rights Florida and a number of other groups filed a series of lawsuits challenging the measure (SB 90), passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature this spring as part of GOP leaders’ nationwide attempts to make it more difficult for people to vote by mail. Lawyers for the plaintiffs allege that the changes are...

Former President Trump and his allies are struggling to clear the Republican field in North Carolina’s wide-open U.S. Senate race and galvanize GOP voters around his preferred candidate, Rep. Ted Budd (R-N.C.). Despite winning the former president’s endorsement early on, Budd has so far failed to become the runaway favorite in the GOP primary and has regularly trailed his chief rival, former Gov. Pat McCrory, in polling. That set off an effort by Trump and Budd’s allies to nudge former Rep. Mark Walker (R-N.C.) out of the race by promising an endorsement if Walker runs instead for a Greensboro-area House...