The Oklahoma Election Board has determined that the Libertarian Party’s petition for party status is valid. This is the first time any party, other than the Democratic and Republican Parties, has been qualified in Oklahoma since November 2000, except that Americans Elect qualified in 2011 but then didn’t run any candidates. Oklahoma voters may now register into the Libertarian Party and election officials will tally them. Current voter registration forms have a blank line in the part of the card that asks about party affiliation.
The most difficult petition requirement the Libertarian Party must now complete, in order to have its presidential nominee on the ballot in all states in 2016, is the Illinois requirement, 25,000 signatures.
Actually, the Americans Elect party was qualified in 2012, but they ran no candidates that year, despite the best efforts of Gary Johnson supporters to use them to nominate him on the AE ticket.
Good point. I’ll amend the post.
AND… a big THANK YOU to Richard Winger for largely making this victory possible with a generous $30,000 contribution to seed the paid petition effort! That’s called putting your money where your beliefs are folks.
All right!
Thank you Richard for playing a big role in making this happen.
Outstanding!
validity rate of petitions collected was 72.3%.
“Jim Linger on March 21, 2016 at 3:57 pm said:
validity rate of petitions collected was 72.3%.”
That is good, but one of the things that saved the LP petition drive in Oklahoma is that it turned out that they had a more lax standard for what constitutes a valid signature than we had originally thought that they did.
Thank you Richard Winger for your very generous contribution helping to fund the Oklahoma petition drive: an admirable and noble action.
For independents, is the requirement still over 70,000 in Oklahoma?
Aaron,
New parties need to turn in a petition equal to 3% of the last election for Governor. That was 24,745 signatures. If a candidate for President, either of an unqualified party or as an Independent, wishes to be on the ballot, that candidate needs to turn in a petition equal to 40,047 signatures or 3% of the last election for President. The deadline for that is in July. There is no fee in lieu of a petition for that office.
I was looking at state-level positions, which strangely appears higher. Here’s a link which also references back to Richard: https://ballotpedia.org/Ballot_access_requirements_for_presidential_candidates_in_Oklahoma
For all offices except president, you can pay a filing fee to run for office, regardless of party affiliation. For US Senate, the fee is $1000, US Congressman $750, State Senator and State Rep are $200. You can also petition if you wish, but the requirement for that is 4% of all voters eligible to vote for you in the first election you appear on the ballot. For a qualified party, that is 4% of all voters of your party in your district. For independent candidates, that is all voters in your district regardless of party because the first ballot you appear on is the November ballot.
Suffice it to say, a petition to run for office is beyond reasonable and no one has ever attempted one.
There Libertarian Party of Oklahoma has had candidates on the ballot for offices other than president over the last 16 years since they last had party status, due to the easier requirement described above for independent candidates for offices other than president, but since these candidates did not have the Libertarian Party label next to their names on the ballot, very few people in Oklahoma knew that they were Libertarians.
Now since the Libertarian Party has finally regained party status in Oklahoma, everyone who looks at the ballot will know who the Libertarian Party candidates are. They may not know much about those candidates, but at least they will know that Libertarians are on their ballot.
“There Libertarian Party of Oklahoma”
Should read, “The Libertarian Party of Oklahoma…”
I think this is great. I love having a third party. Best wishes on growth and success.