On May 19, the Louisiana House Committee on House and Governmental Affairs passed HB 420. It moves the deadline for independent presidential candidates to file from the first Tuesday in September, to the first Friday after the first Tuesday in September.
It also revises the deadline for qualified parties to submit their presidential elector candidates. Existing law was ambiguous in 2008. The new law says that if a qualified party fails to submit that party’s candidates for presidential elector by the first Tuesday in September, the national chair of that same party may submit them by the first Friday after the first Tuesday in September.
The old law talked about this 3-day “grace period” for qualified parties not in terms of a particular date, but in terms of “72 hours after the deadline”. Because the Secretary of State in 2008 had extended the deadline because of the storm, and because the Libertarian Party had tried to take advantage of this “grace period”, it was not clear how the 72-hour period should be calculated at instances when the original deadline had been extended. Thanks to Randall Hayes for this news.
This bill would make a bad situation worse. The clear intent of the legislature from the present wording is to allow a national party that has nominated its candidates for pres and vp, to certify a slate of electors should the state party fail to do so. (or there may be no state party) If the same circumstances as 2008 were repeated, and the deadline for state parties were extended, the national party deadline would not be extended, and thus it would make the national “extension” occur before the state deadline. It puts the extension provision on its head and makes it useless. We would be in the same boat we were in in 2008 – the state party failed to file, but that wasn’t know until the Monday after the first Tuesday, and so the LNC would have no means to still get their candidate on the ballot. I’m sure the SoS asked for this bill to take out the 72 hour argument, but now it makes it obvious that his intent is to subvert national party filing should circumstances such as a hurricane close his offices again.
As an additional note, I am not per se opposed to the Legislature setting a firm deadline on the calendar. I am opposed to the Secretary of State or the Governor usurping the Constitutional authority of the legislature to regulate those deadlines. (Dardenne had no authority to extend the filing till Monday)
Under this bill, had it been in effect in 2008, the Republican Party nominee would not have been on the ballot in Louisiana as they did not file until the Monday after the first Tuesday. (and maybe even the Democrat Party either, though that is arguable)