A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit challenging New York’s Even Year Election Law on Monday, throwing out the government plaintiffs’ claims with prejudice and calling municipalities’ participation in the case “troubling,” according to RiverheadLOCAL.
U.S. District Judge Gary R. Brown issued the 22-page ruling after hearing oral argument on June 18. He found the remaining governmental plaintiffs were barred from bringing federal constitutional claims on three independent grounds: their claims were precluded by prior state-court litigation, they lacked Article III standing, and the federal civil rights statute known as Section 1983 does not give governments a cause of action, RiverheadLOCAL reported.
The Even Year Election Law moves most local elections in New York to even-numbered years. The New York Court of Appeals unanimously upheld its constitutionality, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review that decision. Plaintiffs filed the federal lawsuit in October 2025 asserting federal constitutional claims after those state-court avenues were exhausted, according to RiverheadLOCAL.
Barring further relief in the case, the ruling means Riverhead’s 2026 supervisor election will proceed under the law, with voters choosing a supervisor this November to a two-year term designed to align the town’s election cycle with even-numbered years, RiverheadLOCAL reported.
Brown also dismissed with prejudice the claims against the State of New York, Gov. Kathy Hochul, and the New York State Board of Elections, according to RiverheadLOCAL. The non-governmental plaintiffs, including the New York Republican State Committee and county Republican committees, were granted leave to file a second amended complaint naming individual commissioners of the State Board of Elections as defendants. Brown denied as moot the plaintiffs’ request for a preliminary injunction.
In a footnote, Brown questioned the propriety of municipal governments joining the lawsuit alongside partisan political organizations. He cited RiverheadLOCAL reporting that documented more than $1.6 million in taxpayer-funded legal fees paid to plaintiffs’ counsel. “Their presence in this lawsuit is troubling,” Brown wrote, “especially so in light of the substantial legal expenses reportedly billed to the governmental plaintiffs by counsel.” He also flagged “the evident conflict concerns presented by plaintiffs’ counsel’s representation of both partisan political organizations and non-partisan governments in the same action.”
The Town of Riverhead paid at least $207,958.79 in legal fees before voluntarily withdrawing from the case, according to a June 16 RiverheadLOCAL investigation that Brown cited in his ruling. A separate June 25 RiverheadLOCAL report documented legislation introduced by Suffolk County Legislator Greg Doroski seeking to pull Suffolk County from the litigation over its cost.
Doroski said Monday the spending was “a misuse of taxpayer money, and a waste of taxpayer money as well. It has absolutely nothing to do with what folks think about the even year election law. This is Republican-led municipalities bankrolling the Republican committees in a lawsuit that failed,” according to RiverheadLOCAL.
Riverhead and most of the other governmental plaintiffs voluntarily dismissed their claims earlier this month, RiverheadLOCAL reported.
In a statement issued after the ruling, William A. Brewer III of Brewer, Attorneys & Counselors said the decision “clears the way” for Republican committee plaintiffs and several political candidates to continue pressing their First Amendment challenge by filing a new complaint. “The court resolves a set of preliminary questions and gives us a clear path forward. We intend to take it, and we are confident in the strength of our First Amendment challenge,” Brewer said, according to RiverheadLOCAL.
Featured image: Bushwick Daily image
