Featured

The John Locke Foundation published a research brief in February calling for North Carolina to adopt election performance audits (also called procedural audits). Audits that review the vote totals, while important, are insufficient: Nevertheless, having matching sets of numbers does not, in itself, prove that election laws and procedures were followed or that results were...

For much of the first half of 2025, Jefferson Griffin’s challenge to several of the state’s election laws took most of the air out of the election space. While a federal court rightfully rejected Griffin’s argument for changes ex post facto to North Carolina’s election laws and regulations, it allowed state Supreme Court rulings to...

What do you do if you believe that the attorneys tasked with defending a state law or agency sympathize with the plaintiff? That is not an idle question, but a real problem that the United States Supreme Court has recognized since at least 1850 (Lord v. Veazie): The objection in the case before us is,...

North Carolina’s voter rolls are less secure than they should be. One reason for that reduced security is that hundreds of thousands of voter registrations are missing data that would help officials keep the rolls clean. A new lawsuit from the U.S. Department of Justice aims to correct that problem, but it will almost certainly...

Getting an accurate number of how much money truly goes into North Carolina elections is complicated. While there are ways to pull large quantities of campaign finance data through the North Carolina State Board of Elections’ (NCSBE) advanced search system, the system has flaws. While there are ways to build a system to compare each...

The Jackson County Board of Commissioners removed a plaque from a Confederate monument in early April without public discussion or a vote, likely violating North Carolina’s open meetings law. Local governments violate transparency laws North Carolina’s open meetings law requires : Whereas the public bodies that administer the legislative, policy‑making, quasi‑judicial, administrative, and advisory functions...

The new board at the State Board of Elections is well-positioned to correct election law violations exposed by Jefferson Griffin’s lawsuit Those problems include voter registration irregularities, voter ID violations, and violations of the constitutional prohibition of voting by people who have never lived in North Carolina A federal court ruling overturning the retroactive application...

North Carolina has major issues with accurately representing the money spent on our elections.  On paper, our system requires any committee involved in our elections to file with the State Board of Elections (SBE), submit physical reports, and file digital reports after they pass certain financial thresholds. While this is a reasonable model, the problem...

As the North Carolina General Assembly hurtles toward the May 8 crossover deadline, legislators are rushing to pass bills. Bills that do not pass at least one chamber by crossover are unlikely to become law (although there are ways around that problem). One bill, Senate Bill 299, appears unlikely to make the cut. That is...

With Chief District Judge Richard Myers’ latest ruling, the North Carolina Supreme Court race may finally reach a conclusion.  Myers’ ruling rejected the state Court of Appeals ruling as modified by the state Supreme Court, ordering that the race be certified after a one-week stay to allow for any appeals. While Jefferson Griffin has the...

With Chief District Judge Richard Myers’ latest ruling, the North Carolina Supreme Court race may finally reach a conclusion. Myers’ ruling rejected the state Court of Appeals ruling as modified by the state Supreme Court, ordering that the race be certified after a one-week stay to allow for any appeals. While Jefferson Griffin has the...

Legislation passed in 2023 addressed the problem of election officials accepting ballots from nonexistent registrations (due to verification failure). A federal lawsuit settlement threatens to bring that problem back. The “ghost voter” problem The John Locke Foundation’s review of the 2020 election noted a problem with some same-day registrations (SDRs). Unlike all other registrations, some...

With the actions of the North Carolina Court of Appeals this week, the appointment authority of the state board of elections moves from the governor to the state auditor as prescribed in last year’s Senate Bill 382 (SB 382). Although there has been plenty of news coverage on the matter, much of it conflates appointment...

I recently wrote about House Bill 967, a bill advancing in the General Assembly that would regulate voter behavior at polling places and protect political signs outside those locations from theft or vandalism. Another bill moving forward in the legislature would regulate the behavior of election officials, specifically, voting place officials who fail to do...

When historians and political scientists discuss the powers and authority of each state’s various branches, the consensus has been that North Carolina’s governor is among the weakest. However, this long-held view will need to be reevaluated after yesterday’s superior court ruling. The majority of the Wake County Superior Court three-judge panel overseeing the Stein v....

A bill in the General Assembly would regulate behavior at polling places and protect political signs outside those locations from theft or vandalism. House Bill 967, “Disorderly Conduct at Voting Places,” is sponsored by Tricia Cotham (R-Mecklenburg). It has two substantive sections. The first would extend the protection currently given to public facilities to private...

With all avenues of appeal exhausted in state courts, Judge Griffin’s challenge of North Carolina election law has found its way back before federal district court  Judge Richard Myers. The last two weeks have seen rapid action in this case, with Myers seeming to be following suit with a resolution to this appeal, possibly coming...

The North Carolina Supreme Court ruled in Jefferson Griffin vs. North Carolina State Board of Elections on April 11. The decision mostly favored incumbent justice Allison Riggs (who was recused from the case) but leaves enough room for doubt about the status of some ballots that we may not know the final result for another...

The John Locke Foundation published a review of President Donald Trump’s election executive order on March 26. We noted in the review that “the president is nowhere mentioned” in the Constitution’s Elections Clause, meaning that the Framers did not envision a role for the president in setting election policy. For review, here is the full...

The legal challenges for the North Carolina Supreme Court election have been difficult to follow and generated much confusion.  Not only has the case been active in both state and federal jurisdiction, but has involved more contested voters over time. These factors and the way the case has been argued make many people forget that...

I noted last year that the North Carolina State Board of Elections (SBE) needed to reform its new party petition process after problems with several party petitions over the past several years. They have obliged and then some. The SBE wants to add a new chapter to its administrative code focused solely on petitions. The...

One way election officials are supposed to make our elections more secure is by ensuring that every voter registration is unique. There must be one registration for each voter and one voter for each registration. Identifiers such as name, age, or address are not entirely reliable for that purpose because more than one voter can...

North Carolina recognizes the importance of government transparency with its open meetings law Some local governments try to skirt the open meetings law, including by splitting their meetings into two nonmajority meetings The General Assembly should close an apparent loophole in the open meetings law and put a transparency constitutional amendment up for a vote...

The North Carolina Board of Elections should take inspiration from the Federal Elections Commission and create a system to track election finances, not just individual campaigns The North Carolina General Assembly should move to require all campaign committees to file digital reports The NCSBE should use the tools they have and require all campaigns to...