“This is a problem for New Yorkers who will confront a ballot that does not reflect the reality of the field, and may end up throwing away their vote on a candidate who is not running for office,” said Susan Lerner, executive director of Common Cause/NY. “It’s simply unfair and wrong to present the voters with a false choice.”

Kathay Feng, national redistricting director for Common Cause, said once voting maps hit the courts, it becomes more difficult for citizens to weigh in on the process. Speaking at a redistricting seminar, she noted the best way to influence the process was through a ballot.

"In some states where you have judicial elections, or there's a way to influence the judges that are chosen, it's making sure that there is a tremendous amount of voter education," Feng urged.

Anthony Gutierrez, Texas executive director of Common Cause, said the lawsuit shows the need for Congress to preempt such “racially and partisan gerrymandered maps” by restoring the Justice Department’s authority to put Texas under a microscope on election plans.

“While we are grateful for the involvement of the federal government, what we need to stop the five-decade cycle of having to take legal action every 10 years is for Congress to pass the Freedom to Vote Act,” he said.

Susan Lerner, the executive director of the civic watchdog group Common Cause New York and a proponent of all three initiatives, argued that the success of Republican and Conservative attacks highlighted the fragility of democracy itself.

“There was a strong anti-democratic push and the pro-democracy folks stayed home,” she said.
Finally, as written, the ballot questions, which required voters to flip their ballots over to weigh in, were hard to understand, according to Common Cause and like-minded groups.

“With his signature today, Governor Abbott continues the shameful five-decade-long tradition of ramming through extremely gerrymandered maps in an undemocratic process,” Anthony Gutierrez, Common Cause Texas executive director, said in a news release. “These racially and partisan gerrymandered maps deny every voter in Texas from having an equal say in the issues we care about most, like a stronger economy, better schools, and affordable healthcare.”

Jonathan Mehta Stein, executive director of California Common Cause, a nonpartisan, liberal-leaning political advocacy organization, told ABC News that such claims should be expected.

"There will inevitably be claims that the election is rigged because the purveyors of the 'big lie' need these local and state elections in between the major national elections to keep up their momentum; but all of their allegations in the November 2020 election fell flat," Stein said. "There's nothing new under the sun here. And we assume that...

Stephanie Gómez, associated director of Common Cause Texas, said the bill would give partisan poll watchers “unhinged levels of influence over elections” and said the bill would make it harder for all Texans to vote, particularly voters of color and those with disabilities.

Her group also hosted what it called a "honk! for voting rights" protest, encouraging cars to circle the Capitol on Monday morning, hoping for a noisy show of dissent with social distancing baked in.

“All the Republican commissioners need to do is include the magic words ‘prosecutorial discretion’ and a court will then decline to review the action,” said Paul S. Ryan, vice president for litigation at Common Cause, who has regularly filed F.E.C. complaints.

Indeed, Republican commissioners recently deployed that exact phrase — twice — in dismissing an investigation into whether Mr. Trump violated election laws with the payment of $130,000 to the pornographic actress Stormy Daniels in 2016 to keep her from...

Supreme Court justices would face a code of conduct in the bill that would institute new transparency and ethics rules. 

It’s currently “the only federal court that is not bound by the judicial code of conduct,” said Stephen Spaulding, senior counsel of public policy and government affairs for Common Cause, which backs the overhaul.