Judge Tells North Carolina Republicans To Hand Over Docs And Emails Related To Voting Law [View all]

[Playinghardball]

Something stinks in North Carolina. The state’s legislative leaders who crafted the new restrictive voter ID law will have to turn over some of their correspondence and email messages to voters and organizations who are challenging the wide-ranging amendments, according to a federal court ruling. The state tried to block the demand by civil rights groups previously.

An interesting tidbit in this report is that that the attorneys for the lawmakers contended that the lawmakers were protected by legislative immunity and should be free from “arrest or civil process” related to their actions as General Assembly members.

On Thursday U.S. Magistrate Judge Joi Elizabeth Peake issued a ruling which addresses an attempt by lawmakers to quash subpoenas seeking email, correspondence and other documents exchanged while transforming the state’s voting process. This ruling, however, does not make all the communications available.

The Charlotte Observer reports:

In a court hearing earlier this year, attorneys for 13 Republican legislators tried to turn back efforts to get the correspondence released. The NAACP, the League of Women Voters of North Carolina, the American Civil Liberties Union, the U.S. Justice Department and others sued the governor, state legislators and N.C. election board members to obtain the records.

Among the 13 lawmakers were: Sen. Phil Berger, leader of the state Senate; House Speaker Thom Tillis; Sen. Bob Rucho, a Republican from Matthews; and Republican Reps. Ruth Samuelson of Charlotte, Larry Pittman of Concord and David Lewis of Dunn.

Their attorneys contended that the lawmakers were protected by legislative immunity and should be free from “arrest or civil process” related to their actions as General Assembly members.

More here: http://crooksandliars.com/2014/03/judge-tells-north-carolina-republicans