The national Libertarian Party’s ballot access fund has been in debt since 2004, but thanks to a recent fund appeal to the party’s national membership, the fund is now only $2,000 in debt, and donations are still coming in. The New Mexico Libertarian Party is the only state Libertarian party that has done any substantial petitioning on its own in the last six months.
In a similar vein, the Libertarian Party of Texas took on about $25,000 in debt during the successful 2004 petitioning drive. The final portion of this debt was paid off several months ago.
Further updating the situation, the 2004 Texas LP election results were sufficiently strong to earn automatic ballot status in 2006. Midway through the current filing season, 71 candidates have filed for 2006 racess. This exceeds the 70 candidates that ran in 2004, but not the 175 candidates that ran in Texas in 2002.
Why were there so many candidates in 2002? Non-presidential year so assumption that LP could get +5% in a statewde race?