Well, now it's time for our daily Bloomberg Law Brief, exploring legal issues in the news and Today, Bloomberg Law host Greg Store speaks with Kimberly Robinson, a Supreme Court reporter for Bloomberg b NA, and Rebecca Green, a professor at William and Mary Law School, to discuss how allegations of voter fraud and redistricting shape the historical U. S election. Kimberly, arguably the biggest court ruling of the year came in a case involving North Carolina's voting restrictions. Give us a
quick synopsis of that place. Well, this is really an extraordinary decision. I think the important thing to keep in the back of your mind when I'm talking about this case is the fact that race and voting are very much correlated in the South, especially in North Carolina. So it turns out that most minorities tend to vote democratically.
A court here struck down UH North Carolina's voter I D laws and some other restrictions that it said has had surgically UH singled out African Americans, and it was extored area. Because there are really two ways that a court can strike down UH. Some of these voting restrictions. One is if the effect has a discriminatory purpose. Um. That the other is the intent of the legislature is
to discriminate against minorities. And that final one is what the court here said that you know, the legislature really intended to disenfranchise minority voters. Rebecca, let me ask you just a broader question as you look back on what do you think is that the big message of the big takeaway from this this year in election law? Yeah? So um. For me, as I sort of look back at it all, I think what is clear is the fragility of public confidence in our elections. You know, elections
only work if the public has confidence in the outcome. Um. And that confidence was under explicit attack in two thousands sixteen. We have a long history, of course of the losing side alleging fraud in elections, but this year felt very different. Right. We had the integrity of the election being called into the question before uh election day. Uh. That said. What's extraordinary extraordinary also about two thousand sixteen is how smoothly
the election actually went. Before the election, voting rates advocates were bracing for widespread problems at the polls. But as it happened, UM, with few a few exceptions, UH, the election proceeded without major incident. So I think the challenge going forward is figuring out how to shore up public confidence in our elections. Some think the way to do this is to tighten election rules UM. Others see this tightening as a pretext a way to restrict certain people
from accessing the ballot. So figuring out how to navigate between those two perspectives seems to be the difficult task ahead that Skimberly Robinson, a Supreme Court reporter for a Bloomberg b NA, and Rebecca Green, a professor at William and Mary Law School, speaking with the Bloomberg's Gregg Store even us in a Bloomberg Law weekdays at one pm Wall Street Time here on Bloomberg Radio Now among the
legal stories from Bloomberg Law. Dylan Roof has again been found competent to stand trial in last year's massacre at a church in South Carolina. They left nine parishioners dead at a Bible study. After a second hearing over his mental capacity, a judge ruled not only that Roof can be sentenced for his crimes, but can represent himself in those proceedings. The same jury the last month took less than two hours to find Roof guilty of hate crimes,
obstruction of religion and other accounts. Returns to court tomorrow to be to begin to consider his sentence. Thus his morning's Bloomberg Lab Brrie. If you can find more illegal news at Bloomberg law dot com and Bloomberg DNA dot com. Attorneys will find exceptional legal research and business development tools there as well. Visit Bloomberg Law dot com and Bloomberg DNA dot com for more information