Two members of the Suffolk County, New York, county legislature are now enrolled members of the Independence Party. They are Jack Eddington, who just switched to the Independence Party from the Working Families Party, and Jay Schneiderman, who switched from the Republican Party in July 2008. See this article. Eddington is married to Patricia Eddington, who is a member of the New York state legislature. She is still enrolled as a Working Families Party member, one of the two minor party registrants in the New York legislature.
Jack Eddington probably would have remained in the Working Families Party, except that the Suffolk County Working Families Party has been feuding with the statewide Working Families Party for some time, over the issue of who should control the party’s nominations, the county organization or the state organization. The state’s highest court ruled earlier this year in favor of the state organization.
New York counties elect their county legislatures in odd years.
It’s ironic that Jack Eddington left the WFP because their nomination process is not locally controlled. The nomination process of the IP was recently changed so that it is now also centrally controlled at the state level for most state and federal offices, although maybe not for county legislature. They actually used the WFP court case as precedent.
Also, a correction: there is another minor party registrant in the state legislature, Tim Gordon of the Independence Party, although he ran with Democratic backing.
Association, disassociation, with thugs like Frank MacKay, John Blare, John Coffey, John Bambey, and Valli Sharpe Geisler around?
———–Don Lake, used, abused, not amused