U.S. District Court Judge Zahid Quraishi has set a deadline of April 3 for parties in the New Jersey organization line lawsuit to respond to Morris County Republicans’ request to intervene.
An attorney for Morris GOP Chair Laura Marie Ali asked the judge to allow the party organization to join the case on Sunday, one day after Quraishi clarified his Friday ruling and said only Democrats will be subject to an order mandating office block ballots in the June 2024 primary election.
In a text order this morning, Quraishi said he will decide the issue based on the filings, with no court appearances needed. He also raised the issue of whether he still has jurisdiction since a notice of appeal has already been filed.
A federal court clerk also set a May 6 motion date on the issue of whether Quraishi will stay his own ruling after election officials told him they intend to appeal his ruling to the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.
But that was an automatically generated message from the court clerk’s office. It’s unlikely that Quraishi will wait that long since county clerks must commence sending out vote-by-mail ballots on April 20.
These kinds of messages are standard – a judicial AI of sorts – and are frequently superseded by the judge.