By Jacob Solis
INTERNATIONAL
‘Panama Papers’ expose link between offshore accounts and hundreds of companies and individuals, including world leaders
More than 11 million documents leaked from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca have shown links between 140 current and former world leaders in 50 separate countries, according to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and its media partners.
These leaders include the current presidents of Argentina and Ukraine, the king of Saudi Arabia, and close friends and relatives of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, former Libyan dictator Moammar Ghadafi, and Russian president Vladimir Putin.
Over 370 journalists with more than 100 different news outlets searched through the leak in a yearlong investigation. That investigation began when a German paper, Süddeutsche Zeitung, received 2.6 terabytes of leaked documents and concluded when the ICIJ released the findings Sunday.
The firm’s co-founder, Ramon Fonseca, confirmed the authenticity of the documents but added that they were obtained illegally by hackers, according to the Associated Press.
NATIONAL
Supreme Court ruling rejects challenge to ‘one person, one vote’ standard
The Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday that the total population recorded by the Census Bureau should be the population used when counting people for political purposes, like creating legislative districts.
The challenge to this idea, often called “one person, one vote,” came from Citizens for Fair Representation, a conservative activist group. According to NPR, the same group was responsible for successful challenges to the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and against affirmative action in Texas.
The group argued that some legislative districts are diluted by disenfranchised voters, mainly those people who are too young or non-citizens. In theory, this means that voter power is increased in districts with large numbers of ineligible people and diluted in districts with small numbers of ineligible people. With that, the group claimed that “one person, one vote” violated equal protection under the constitution.
However, the decision, written by Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, found that changing the rules now would create undue stress on a system that already works. Moreover, representatives must represent everyone in a district, not just those people who can vote in accordance with the 14th Amendment. Because of this, one person, one vote promotes “equitable and effective representation.”
LOCAL
Nevada voter registration surges in month of March
More than 22,000 Nevadans registered to vote last month — and roughly 16,000 of them were Democrats, according to new numbers from Nevada’s Secretary of State.
In comparison, just over 4,300 people registered Republican in the same time period. It’s swelled the Republican ranks just about 1 percent, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. On the other side of the aisle, the Democrats increased their numbers by about 3.4 percent.
In total, Democrats in Nevada now outnumber Republicans by about 60,000: 501,513 to 441,919.
Jacob Solis can be reached at jsolis@sagebrush.unr.edu and on Twitter @TheSagebrush.