Chiafalo v. Washington

Chiafalo v. Washington
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued May 13, 2020 Decided July 6, 2020
Full case name	Peter B. Chiafalo, Levi Jennet Guerra, and Esther Virginia John, Petitioners v. Washington
Docket no.	19-465
Citations	591 U.S. ___ (more) 140 S. Ct. 2316
Case history
Prior	Matter of Guerra, 193 Wash. 2d 380, 441 P.3d 807 (2019); cert. granted, 140 S. Ct. 918 (2020)
Holding
A State may enforce an elector's pledge to support his party's nominee—and the state voters' choice—for President.
Court membership
Chief Justice John Roberts Associate Justices Clarence Thomas · Ruth Bader Ginsburg Stephen Breyer · Samuel Alito Sonia Sotomayor · Elena Kagan Neil Gorsuch · Brett Kavanaugh
Case opinions
Majority	Kagan, joined by Roberts, Ginsburg, Breyer, Alito, Sotomayor, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh
Concurrence	Thomas (in judgment), joined by Gorsuch (Part II)
Laws applied
U.S. Const. art. II, § 1, cl. 2

Colorado Department of State v. Baca
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued May 13, 2020 Decided July 6, 2020
Full case name	Colorado Department of State, Petitioners v. Micheal Baca, Polly Baca, and Robert Nemanich
Docket no.	19-518
Citations	591 U.S. ___ (more)
Case history
Prior	Baca v. Hickenlooper, No. 16-cv-02986 (D. Colo.)
Holding
Judgment of Tenth Circuit reversed in light of Chiafalo v. Washington.
Court membership
Chief Justice John Roberts Associate Justices Clarence Thomas · Ruth Bader Ginsburg Stephen Breyer · Samuel Alito Sonia Sotomayor · Elena Kagan Neil Gorsuch · Brett Kavanaugh
Case opinions
Per curiam
Concurrence	Thomas (in judgment, did not file an opinion)
Sotomayor took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.
Laws applied
U.S. Const. art. II, § 1, cl. 2

Chiafalo v. Washington, 591 U.S. ___ (2020), was a United States Supreme Court case on the issue of "faithless electors" in the Electoral College stemming from the 2016 United States presidential election. The Court ruled unanimously, by a vote of 9–0, that states have the ability to enforce an elector's pledge in presidential elections. Chiafalo deals with electors who received US$1,000 fines for not voting for the nominees of their party in the state of Washington. The case was originally consolidated with Colorado Department of State v. Baca, 591 U.S. ___ (2020), a similar case based on a challenge to a Colorado law providing for the removal and replacement of an elector who does not vote for the presidential candidate who received the most votes in the state, with the electors claiming they have discretion to vote as they choose under the Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution.^[1][2] On March 10, 2020, Justice Sonia Sotomayor recused herself in the Colorado case due to a prior relationship to a respondent, and the cases were decided separately on July 6, 2020. Baca was a per curiam decision that followed from the unanimous ruling in Chiafalo against the faithless electors and in favor of the state.