Elections

Talk of Tennessee resident Ashley Judd running for U.S. Senate in Kentucky has turned up ambiguity in residency requirements that a state legislative leader says needs to be cleared up.

The U.S. Constitution requires only that Senate candidates be residents of the state they would represent "when elected." But Kentucky election law raises questions about whether candidates can have their names placed on ballots if they're not registered to vote in Kentucky. And only legal residents can be registered to vote.

Kentucky state Senate Floor Leader Damon Thayer said Tuesday the issue has never before been raised here. Thayer said the Legislature may have to address the ambiguity.

Judd, an actress who lives outside Nashville, is considering a run against U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky next year.

A bill allowing electronic voting for military members overseas has cleared the state House after amendments were added to allow for the electronic return of a ballot.

Senate Bill 1 did not original include the electronic return, despite Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes preferring the provision.

Many GOP lawmakers said the electronic return would leave ballots open to fraud and abuse. And state representative Tim Moore, an Air Force reservist and a Hardin County Republican, says he believes it would compromise legal protections for a secret ballot.

"I absolutely believe that this violates the very Constitution these folks are sworn to uphold."

A Republican-led push to use college IDs to vote in Tennessee was held up on the floor of the state Senate Thursday, as a disagreement has broken out between GOP lawmakers over the issue.

The legislation comes from a Rutherford County lawmaker, home to the largest undergraduate student body in the state. And while Senator Bill Ketron refused to accept student IDs when the law was passed two years ago, he’s now had a change of heart.

Senator Stacy Campfield of Knoxville has not.

“You know, I hate to say it, but possibly in my younger days I may have known a person or two who had a falsified college ID,” said Campfield.