National Roundup

Maine
Lawsuits target referendum aimed at curbing foreign influence in local elections
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Two utilities and two media organizations are suing over a referendum in Maine that closed a loophole in federal election law that allows foreign entities to spend on local and state ballot measures.

The three lawsuits take aim at the proposal overwhelmingly approved by voters on Nov. 7 to address foreign election influence.

The Maine Association of Broadcasters and Maine Press Association contend the new law imposes a censorship mandate on news outlets, which are required to police campaign ads to ensure there’s no foreign government influence.

Meanwhile, Central Maine Power and Versant, the state’s largest electric utilities, each filed separate lawsuits raising constitutional challenges that contend the referendum violates their free speech and engagement on issues that affect them.

The Maine Commission on Government Ethics and Campaign Practices is studying the federal complaints filed Tuesday and consulting with the attorney general, Jonathan Wayne, the commission’s executive director, said Wednesday in an email.

The attorney general’s office declined comment.

The referendum, which was approved by about 84% of voters who cast ballots, bans foreign governments — or companies with 5% or more foreign government ownership — from donating to state referendum races.

The proposal was put on the ballot after a Canadian government-owned utility, Hydro Quebec, spent $22 million to influence a project on which it’s a partner in Maine. That hydropower corridor project ultimately moved forward after legal challenges.

But there are implications for Maine-based utilities, too.

The law applies to Versant because it’s owned by the city of Calgary in Alberta, Canada, but it’s unclear whether it applies to Central Maine Power.

CMP’s corporate parent Avangrid narrowly missed the cutoff by one measure. It is owned by a Spanish company — not the government — and minority shareholders owned by foreign governments, Norway’s central bank Norges Bank and the government-owned Qatar Investment Authority, together fall below the 5% threshold.

But Qatar Investment Authority also has an 8.7% minority stake in Spain-based Iberdrola, which owns Avangrid and CMP, and that’s part of the reason CMP argues that the law is unconstitutionally vague.

Before the Maine proposal went to voters it was vetoed by Democratic Gov. Janet Mills, who cited concerns about the proposal’s constitutionality and said its broadness could silence ‘legitimate voices, including Maine-based businesses.’
Federal election law currently bans foreign entities from spending on candidate elections, but allows such donations for local and state ballot measures.

Maine was the 10th state to close the election spending loophole when the referendum was approved, according to the Campaign Legal Center in Washington, D.C., which supported the Maine proposal.

New Mexico
Supreme Court weighs whether to strike down local abortion restrictions
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — The New Mexico Supreme Court is weighing whether to strike down local abortion restrictions by conservative cities and counties at the request of the attorney general for the state where abortion laws are among the most liberal in the country.

Oral arguments were scheduled for Wednesday in Santa Fe. At least four state supreme courts are grappling with abortion litigation this week in the aftermath of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last year to rescind the constitutional right to abortion.

In New Mexico’s Lea and Roosevelt counties and the cities of Hobbs and Clovis, where opposition to abortion runs deep, officials argue that local governments have the right to back federal abortion restrictions under a 19th century U.S. law that prohibits the shipping of abortion medication and supplies. They say the local abortion ordinances can’t be struck down until federal courts rule on the meaning of provision within the ‘anti-vice’ law known as the Comstock Act.

Attorney General Raúl Torrez has argued that the recently enacted local laws violate state constitutional guarantees — including New Mexico’s equal rights amendment that prohibits discrimination based on sex or being pregnant.

Since the court case began, additional local ordinances have been adopted to restrict abortion near Albuquerque and along the state line with Texas.

New Mexico is among seven states that allow abortions up until birth, and it has become a major destination for people from other states with bans, especially Texas, who are seeking procedures.

A pregnant Texas woman whose fetus has a fatal condition left the state to get an abortion elsewhere before the state Supreme Court on Monday rejected her unprecedented challenge of one of the most restrictive bans in the U.S.
In 2021, the New Mexico Legislature repealed a dormant 1969 statute that outlawed most abortion procedures as felonies, ensuring access to abortion even after the U.S. Supreme Court rolled back guarantees last year.

Earlier this year, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed a bill that overrides local ordinances aimed at limiting abortion access and enacted a shield law that protects abortion providers from investigations by other states.

On Tuesday, the Arizona Supreme Court grilled lawyers about a pre-statehood ban in 1864 on nearly all abortions and whether it has been limited or made moot by other statutes enacted over the past 50 years.

Arizona’s high court is reviewing a lower-court decision that said doctors couldn’t be charged for performing the procedure in the first 15 weeks of pregnancy because other, more recent laws have allowed them to provide abortions.


Iowa
Ex-police officer sentenced for exploiting teen
CLARKSVILLE, Iowa (AP) — A judge sentenced a former Iowa police officer to 15 years in prison for allegedly exchanging nude photos with a minor he met while investigating a sex offender.

Iowa Judge Rustin Davenport on Monday sentenced former Clarksville officer Michael William Tobin, the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier reported.

Prosecutors said Tobin, 35, met a teenager while investigating a sex offender who had offered minors alcohol and cigarettes for nude photos of themselves.

Tobin had sex with the teen after she joined the department’s ride-along program in 2021. He then exchanged nude photos with her, had her ask for naked photos of one of her friends, and showed her photos of other nude teenagers that were evidence in another criminal investigation.

A jury found Tobin guilty in October. Tobin resigned from his job as a Clarksville lieutenant in 2022.