State faces setback in challenge to Shasta’s Measure B
A California appeals court has declined to hear the merits of the case against Measure B, saying the state should refile in another venue. With the midterms only months away, the attorney general’s office said it plans to move quickly.
Earlier this month, Shasta County made national headlines when it was sued by the state of California over Measure B, a voter-approved ballot measure seeking to change local election procedures.
The measure was supported by a majority of June primary voters — about 29,000 of the county’s approximately 116,000 registered voters supported the initiative. But implementing Measure B, which includes requirements for voter ID, limited absentee ballots and hand counting at precincts, would contradict statewide laws.
The lawsuit against Measure B, submitted by California’s attorney general and secretary of state a couple of weeks ago, was filed in the California’s Third Appellate District. Yesterday, the court denied the state’s request to review the suit, instructing California to refile in a trial court instead.
It’s only a temporary setback, state officials emphasized. A spokesperson for the attorney general’s office told Shasta Scout that the court’s order was “purely procedural” and that the petitioners will “quickly move to obtain relief in the appropriate court to protect voters’ rights and enforce state election laws.”
Moving quickly is an imperative, with a November deadline looming and much to be determined about how Shasta’s elections will be run. The measure would mandate a government-issued photo ID to vote and greatly limits eligibility for absentee ballots. It does not lay out specific instructions for many of its requirements, including how the county should implement the process of separating Shasta’s voter rolls from state oversight.
Shasta Registrar of Voters Clint Curtis told Shasta Scout today that he’s already working toward a plan to implement Measure B by November, but he said separating the voter rolls, the one aspect of the measure that could theoretically be implemented immediately, won’t start yet.
“We are not implementing separation of the voter rolls as [of] yet as we would need more definition,” Curtis said, noting that the measure’s language is “not clear” about how to contain Shasta’s voter rolls to “a computer with open-source software that is not connected to the internet.”
Earlier this month, Shasta County’s supervisors voted not to defend the county against the suit, angering some community members. But the proponents behind Measure B, who are listed as parties of real interest in the suit and have retained legal counsel, issued a press release today in response to the court’s decision. Alex Haberbush, the proponents’ lead counsel, said in the statement that “this is the third time Measure B’s opponents have dragged us into court to stop Measure B — and the third time they have failed.”
It’s a reference to a series of legal challenges Measure B has faced since last year. Those challenges began when the county’s own attorney asked the Shasta County Superior Court for permission not to move forward with the required paperwork to begin the initiative process. The court ruled against arguments made by County Counsel Joseph Larmour in that case, and ballot proponents went on to gather more than 10,000 signatures in support of the measure, with about 7,000 later verified through a random sampling process.
The initiative faced another legal challenge this spring from registered nurse Jennifer Katske, who said it should not be placed on ballots because it would be illegal to implement. A Shasta judge ruled against Katske, saying the measure shouldn’t be challenged until after voters had been able to weigh in.
The factual basis for the state’s suit against the measure focuses in large part on the argument that Shasta’s charter status does not grant it authority to implement local laws that are inconsistent with the California Constitution, including elections. In his statement today, Haberbush disputed that factual basis.
“The State’s case rests on the claim that a charter county has no authority over its own elections — and it gets there by stretching a 1994 decision that had nothing to do with elections,” Haberbush wrote.
He added that he finds it “particularly disappointing” that the county chose not to defend against the state’s initial filing.
“At a minimum, it should have defended the authority of Shasta County’s own Superior Court to hear the case in the first instance — the very result the Court of Appeal reached today.”
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I’m not concerned. One court just punted the ball to another court citing a procedural issue. Measure B remains profoundly at odds with California’s constitution and state election law, and Shasta County remains an entity of the State—none of which is changed by its Charter County status regardless of what our MAGA lunatics collectively hallucinate.
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It won’t take much longer to shit-can this nonsense.
You quote Haberbush as saying: “The State’s case rests on the claim that a charter county has no authority over its own elections — and it gets there by stretching a 1994 decision that had nothing to do with elections,” So, what was that decision and what was the holding?
Most likely Dibb v. County of San Diego (1994) which held that the California Constitution provides Charter Counties much more limited authority than Charter Cities:
>>>Whereas charter county “home rule” authority is limited to matters concerning the structure and operation of local government, the version of “home rule” afforded to a charter city is substantially more expansive.
Thank you.
Folks, the local Clint Curtis – Patric Jones – Laura Hobbs show is just the alt-right pimple on Trump’s wannabe fascist nation behind. We know Curtis is in contact with the United States Department of Justice Civil Rights Division and other DOJ components, spreading claims of voter fraud here in Shasta County; he has admitted so, and I have seen the CPRAs. I do not know whether Curtis has been in contact with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California, led by “Assistant” Bill Essayli.
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“I called up the very powerful and very good U.S. attorney in California (Bill Essayli), and I said, ‘Do me a favor. Take a look, they are trying to steal that election, too…. (A U.S. District Judge ruled that Essayli was unlawfully serving as the “Acting” U.S. Attorney. Essayli was not confirmed, so he was demoted to an “Assistant….”) Trump says, “We should take over the voting, the voting in many places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.” Yes, it’s no secret that Trump is trying to steal the November election.
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Now, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) and Reuters revealed last week that White House officials have spent months refusing to release the DNI Voting-Machine Report. Like our local MAGA election liars, Trump wants to use the lie of rigged voting machines, but can’t because the reports state there is no proof of rigged elections!
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Keep your eyes wide open. We are just 128 days away… Midterm Elections, Tuesday, November 3, 2026.
Mr. Haberbush. Welcome back to Shasta County, where the Shasta County Board of Supervisors voted that it does not want your services. Here’s an offer for you. Let’s bet each other $50.00 to a charity of choice that you will lose once again.
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In the meantime, Clint Curtis and his “Real Parties of Interest” will once again waste even more hard-earned Shasta County taxpayers’ money trying to substantiate a 34-count convicted criminal’s BIG LIE for local far-right extremists and much of the Shasta County Republican Party.
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Thanks to you Mr. Haberbush your “Real Parties of Interest” and our local MAGA, Shasta County will again be in local, national, and international news as we struggle under the 34-count felon’s inflation and the Republican Big Beautiful Bill, to take care of children, seniors in long-term care, people with disabilities, and lower-income working adults, roughly one-third of the county’s population, who have begun to lose health care, food (SNAP), Medicare, and access to clinics and hospitals.
I’m so tired of all this maga bullshit.
Why is it that there were no voter fraud issues before the rotten orange showed up?
Why can’t these maga people do something positive for the people?
They are all whores to big business and perpetuating their maga representatives .
I so much want a blue tsunami and a return to normality .
Before Republicans were disparaging Dominion, Democrats were disparaging Diebold. 34 Congressional Democrats denied that Bush won in 2004.
Clint Curtis was one of those election denier Democrats (he registered as a Republican only after moving to Shasta County).
More modern election denier Democrats include Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Hakeem Jeffries, Jasmine Crockett, and James Clyburn.
And if you go waaaay back, Democrat Jimmy Carter first took major office by challenging the results of a primary that he lost (at least on paper). The experience made him one of the first “election integrity” advocates pushing for voter ID.
The entire ‘hanging Chad’
Was just another example of political bullying
Hanging chads actually hurt Bush (older voters had more difficulty punching ballots and older voters went disproportionately for Bush over Gore).
What arguably won Bush the election was the use of a potentially confusing “butterfly ballot” in Palm Beach County which likely caused some Gore voters to mistakenly vote for Pat Buchanan. Democratic estimates put the number of misdirected votes at 2,000 (Bush won the whole state by only ~500). But this estimate relies on the assumption that election day voters (with the butterfly ballot) would have voted the exact same was as mail-in voters (who did not have a butterfly ballot). This highly flawed assumption forms the basis of the supposed “Mesa Pattern of Fraud” despite ample evidence significant political differences between in-person and mail-in voters.
The butterfly ballot was only used in that election, but it was actually designed by a local Democrat election official, Theresa LePore, to accommodate the unusual number of candidates on the original size ballot.
That’s not to say parties don’t use dirty tricks to tip the scales. This year Democrats appear to be backing a “ghost candidate” in with the same name as the incumbent Republican in an effort to dilute Republican votes. Republicans have often used this trick themselves.
Typical MAGA.
Wasn’t it the Supreme Court that gave the victory to bush?
It is a myth that the Supreme Court gave Bush the election. A group of news organizations including the AP and USA Today funded an independent recount which found: “George W. Bush would have widened his 537-vote victory to a 1,665-vote margin if the recount ordered by the Florida Supreme Court would have been allowed to continue…”
Again, hanging chads hurt Bush more than Gore…
If Florida had done a full recount of the entire state and used an incredibly generous voter intent interpretation not allowed anywhere, something Gore did not ask for, Gore would have won by 100-400 votes.
Instead Gore asked for 2 different partial recounts, neither allowed by law:
1) Gore wanted to recount ballots in only Democratic strongholds.
2) Gore wanted to recount only “undervote” ballots — ballots with either hanging chads (incompletely punched ballots) or pregnant chads (dimpled ballots)
So there was wide spread voter fraud before trump?
2000 wasn’t affected by voter fraud. The butterfly ballot was what arguably changed the outcome, but it was actually a well-intentioned ballot design meant to keep voters from accidentally “voting for 1 candidate” on both pages, invalidating their votes.
The last presidential election potentially affected by voter fraud was the election of JFK in 1960 with pretty blatant cheating in Chicago and Texas. It is possible that cheating was widespread enough to swing the 9,000 votes in Illinois and 46,000 votes in Texas that Nixon needed to win, but unlikely. For all his many faults, Nixon conceded the election and attempted to stop any election investigations “for the good of the country.”
LBJ (JFK’s running mate) had a history of blatant cheating in Texas, winning election to the Senate in 1948 after a “missing” box of 202 ballots was “found” 1 week after the election. The names were in alphabetical order, in the same handwriting, and 200 of the 202 went for Johnson, electing him by 87 votes.
Since each state determines how their elections are conducted, there will always be disagreements about what methods are best. California strives to make voting as easy as possible while other states do not. Some states use voting machines while California uses only paper ballots. It is important to note that hand counting is only used in a few tiny jurisdictions with no more than a few thousand voters. If anyone believes elections are rigged, they should educate themselves on the many safeguards in place to ensure election integrity and fairness. As long as we don’t have people like Tina Peters or Clint Curtis overseeing our elections, we should trust the process.
PS: What became of Diebold you might ask? They were bought out by Dominion in 2010.
Not that MAGAs care one way or the other, but insisting on election integrity is a far cry from accepting every win as legit and claiming that every election that you lose is rigged—page 1 of the MAGA playbook.
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VP JD “Eyeliner” Vance was on Bill Maher’s show this past weekend. Former “Never Trumper” turned “Trump Boot Polisher” Vance was there to pimp his new book about being a born-again Catholic—he clearly sees flying his Jeebus flag as crucial to his chances of being the next GOP candidate for POTUS. So weird listening to his fake concern for the eternal fate of Maher’s atheistic soul, but not for that of his Hindu wife.
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Maher claimed that his vote—D or R—is always in play. It isn’t, but he did tell Vance what the GOP would have to do to have it be in play—they would have to abandon the election fabulism that claims that every time they lose, the contest was rigged. He challenged Vance to sign up to that pledge.
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Vance, of course, can’t do that. To go against Orange Mussolini is still political suicide for Repubs, in spite of the President’s historically low popularity. Instead, Vance offered a mealy-mouthed defense of Trump’s insanely random paranoias about voter fraud, trying to reduce them to an actual problem with voter ID without (as always) offering any evidence. I’m so sick of Repubs pretending that lax voter ID laws are proof of widespread voter fraud, when their desire is so obviously to disenfranchise as many voters as possible.
Excellent review. Without historical perspective you become a prisoner of the moment like so many of the frenetic liberal voices in this chat. With no context for these guys, anyone patriotic is a fascist and Trump becomes Hitler. Hilter murdered millions of people. Trump wont be president in 36 months.
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These guys are like my gorlfriend when she says you’re driving too fast. Relax, daddy’s got you.
I value your presence here, Nick. We absolutely need at least one Trump fluffer/boot polisher in the room.
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As for the accusations of fascism, you brought it on yourselves. Yes, equating the MAGA party and Trump with the NAZI party and Hitler in the peak WWII era is hyperbolic, but the comparisons current-day USA to early 1930s Germany are not. Incidentally, I usually refer to Trump as Orange Mussolini instead of Hitler because I regard him as a Temu-grade despot.
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Curious, though. Does your “gorlfriend” like it when you refer to yourself as daddy? If she does, I’m guessing she’d score a 9 or 10 on the ACEs trauma quiz.
Thanks for the invitation to squirrel away attention from the ongoing attack on democracy.
No thanks.
I provided my proof of citizenship when I registered to vote. I have been voting since 1978 and have never once had my registration questioned. Requiring me to provide proof of citizenship again, over my sworn statement that I am a citizen is ridiculous due to the lack of evidence of voter fraud.
Attorney Haberbush misrepresents the AG’s legal position when he claims that the AG’s argument is based upon a 1994 decision that had nothing to do with elections. The authority he refers to was actually decided in 1994 and is the leading case that defines the limits of ‘home rule’ for charter counties, which is indeed at issue raised by Measure B. Contrary to what Haberbush would have you believe, the AG’s position with respect to conflicts with the California Elections Code rests primarily upon the recent 2025 appellate decision in Bonta v. City of Huntington Beach that overturned a local charter amendment that attempted to force voter ID despite contrary provisions in the Elections Code. [See 115 Cal.App.5th 962.] Haberbush is being disingenuous. Perhaps he thinks people won’t notice. Perhaps he thinks he is clever. If so, he is mistaken.
Get ready boys and girls, the circus is coming to town! All the court did was instruct the state to file in the local jurisdiction. If the Shasta Superior court fails to follow the law, the Appeals Court will take it up. The result will be the same. Measure B(ozo) will go down in flames.
Selah