Voter ID case is going to trial (Texas' motion to dismiss mostly overruled)

[Gothmog]

Greg Abbott has been trying to get all of the claims and lawsuits dismissed in the Texas voter id lawsuit. The State of Texas made several motions to dismiss and attacked the standing of all of the plaintiffs in this case trying to keep the case from going to trial. On July 2, 2014, the court ruled against Greg Abbott's motions for the most part. http://electionlawblog.org/?p=63103

The court mostly denied Texas’s motion to dismiss, even allowing claims to go forward at this point on voter id as a poll tax and as a First Amendment violation. That’s not to say these will be winning claims, but it is significant that plaintiffs will get to advance a number of federal theories against the id law.

The only bad thing is that the counties of Dallas and Hidalgo were found not to have standing in this case and were dismissed out.

This means that the key federal causes of actions were upheld and can go to trial. Normally in a big case like this in the corporate world, the defendants start talking settlement after losing their motions to dismiss. There will be no settlement in this case given the fact that Greg Abbott is staking his reputation on it.

Finally, is anyone surprised that Greg lost another round? Greg is a bad attorney

[blogslut]

1. Has that man ever won a lawsuit?

I mean, besides the one that compensated him for his injury?

[Gothmog]

2. Good question

I would love to see him lose the July 17 redistricting case and the voter id case both. If there are section 3 bail in findings, then Texas may be able to vote again

[Gothmog]

3. Here is a good MSNBC article on the recent ruling

The fact that an expert stated that Abbott's arguments did not pass the laugh tests is accurate. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/texas-voter-id-law-must-stand-trial-judge-rules

But last week’s ruling, in which U.S. District Court Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos denied almost all of a set of motions filed by Abbott’s office to dismiss the case before it goes to trial, suggests that keeping the law in place won’t be a slam-dunk for the AG and his allies.

To be sure, the ruling itself wasn’t a surprise—and election law experts caution not to read too much into it. All Ramos did was give permission for the law’s challengers to make their case, as any good judge would have done, they say. The final ruling, of course, will come down to whether the plaintiffs can present facts that prove that case during the trial, scheduled to start September 2.

Daniel Tokaji, a law professor at the Ohio State University, said some of Texas’s arguments “don’t pass the laugh test,” so it makes sense that Ramos didn’t give them the time of day.

But the approach taken by Ramos, an Obama appointee—and in particular, the unequivocal way in which she rejected Texas’s effort to narrow the scope of federal voting protections—suggests the trial could play out on favorable terrain for the law’s challengers.

Greg is a really bad attorney and other people are laughing at his arguments