NASHVILLE, T.N. — Today, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) is appearing in Davidson County Chancery Court in Nashville, Tennessee for a hearing. CLC filed a lawsuit in December 2024 on behalf of Ernest Falls to compel Mark Goins – Tennessee’s Coordinator of Elections – to notify Mr. Falls’ county election officials that his constitutional right to vote has been restored. This lawsuit, which was filed in conjunction with Free Hearts and Sherrard Roe Voigt & Harbison, PLC, is the latest attempt to challenge the state’s arbitrary rights restoration process that deprives impacted residents of their ability to actively participate in the democratic process. 

“Our democracy is strongest when our elections are more inclusive and accessible to everyone who can participate in the process,” said Blair Bowie, director of Restore Your Vote at CLC. “When election officials change the rules for rights restoration arbitrarily, as is the case in Tennessee, people like Ernest Falls continue to be wrongfully excluded from the democratic process. The state of Tennessee must change course and affirm the right of citizens like Mr. Falls to vote.” 

In 1986, Ernest Falls was convicted of a single felony in Virginia for which he has long since served his sentence. Since moving to Tennessee six years ago, Mr. Falls has navigated a complex and shifting obstacle course in order to restore his right to vote. 

The Tennessee Division of Elections, led by Coordinator Mark Goins, has imposed ever-changing requirements on Tennesseans like Mr. Falls who are seeking to restore their right to vote. Despite spending years in litigation and trying to comply with shifting requirements, Mr. Falls is still unable to vote in the state of Tennessee. 

While reforms to rights restoration laws are ongoing, millions of Americans nationwide with past felony convictions have been systemically deprived of their right to vote. Tennessee likely has the highest rate of disenfranchisement in the United States because over 470,000 citizens — including over 21 percent of Black voters — cannot vote in the state due to prior felony convictions. 

“Mr. Falls did everything required, yet Tennessee officials keep changing rules, just like they do for hundreds and thousands of others,” said Dawn Harrington, executive director of Free Hearts. “We have to keep standing together and fighting to stop this injustice and Free the Vote." 

Despite the challenges that people like Ernest Falls face to vote, Tennesseans across the political spectrum are overwhelmingly in favor of rights restoration. CLC will keep pushing for states like Tennessee to follow its law to restore the rights of people with previous felony convictions to vote so that they can be full participants in the democratic process.

Washington, D.C. — Today, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to investigate New York City Mayor Eric Adams, who allegedly solicited and directed foreign nationals to illegally contribute to his 2021 and 2025 campaigns for mayor of New York City — this includes arrangements to use U.S. citizens as “straw donors” to conceal the foreign sources of the campaign contributions. By doing so, Adams and his foreign contributors evaded federal laws prohibiting foreign spending on U.S. elections. 

While the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has abandoned its duty to pursue justice and accountability for this corrupt scheme, the FEC is in a unique position to step up and fulfill its responsibility to safeguard our elections from foreign influence. 

“Protecting American elections from foreign influence is essential to safeguarding our democracy,” said Erin Chlopak, senior director for campaign finance at Campaign Legal Center. “The Justice Department’s abandonment of its commitment to pursue illegal foreign influence in our elections makes the FEC’s independent enforcement authority all the more critical. When candidates and public officials invite foreign actors to influence our democratic process and government, public trust in our democracy is undermined. The FEC must step up to protect the integrity of our elections and pursue this blatantly corrupt scheme.” 

Federal campaign finance law prohibits a foreign national from promising or attempting to make either a direct or indirect contribution in connection with a federal, state or local election. The foreign national ban is one of the most important provisions in federal campaign finance law — it’s the only one that applies to federal, state and local elections. 

The FEC’s duty is clear — it must pursue this matter and assure the American people that foreign interference in American elections will not be tolerated.

In response to President Donald Trump’s firing of David Huitema, the head of the Office of Government Ethics, Kedric Payne, Vice President, General Counsel and Senior Director for Ethics at Campaign Legal Center and former Deputy Chief Counsel of the Office of Congressional Ethics, issued the following statement:

“President Trump’s decision to remove David Huitema just a few months after his confirmation to a five-year term is the latest move in a series of attacks directly aimed at removing accountability for the executive branch. 

"In response to a culture of corruption in President Nixon’s administration, the Office of Government Ethics (OGE) was established to root out those who used public office for private gain. The OGE has the immense responsibility of reviewing the financial interests of thousands of public servants and making the public aware of their conflicts of interest — including presidential nominees for the most powerful positions in our government.  

"This term, President Trump has nominated the wealthiest presidential Cabinet in history, stacked with deep-pocketed business leaders weighed down by significant conflicts of interests, making the role of the OGE even more important. The American people need independent oversight to ensure that these officials are working for the public good, not personal gain.  

"The removal of the nation’s top ethics official is President Trump’s latest action to remove any meaningful way to hold members of his government accountable to any ethics laws."

Statement of Trevor Potter, Republican former chair of the FEC and president of Campaign Legal Center:

“In claiming to fire a commissioner of the Federal Election Commission, the president violates the law, the separation of powers, and generations of Supreme Court precedent. Congress explicitly, and intentionally, created the FEC to be an independent, bipartisan federal agency whose commissioners are confirmed by Congress to serve the vital role of protecting the democratic rights of American voters. As the only agency that regulates the president, Congress intentionally did not grant the president the power to fire FEC commissioners.

"As a former commissioner and chair of the FEC, serving under multiple presidents, I know firsthand the importance of this agency to a functioning democracy. I was appointed as a Republican in the last year of President George H.W. Bush’s presidency, and served through the Clinton presidency, because I was confirmed to a term appointment by the Senate.

"With multiple FEC commissioners serving on expired terms and one vacant seat, Trump is free to nominate multiple new commissioners and to allow Congress to perform its constitutional role of advice and consent. It’s contrary to law that he has instead opted to claim to ‘fire’ a single Democratic commissioner who has been an outspoken critic of the president’s lawbreaking and of the FEC’s failure to hold him accountable.”