On April 30, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo released the text of a proposed election law bill he hopes the legislature will pass. The proposal is identified as “Legislative Bill Drafting Commission 12024-02-3”, or as “Governor’s Program Bill #4.” The bill, if enacted, would allow anyone to run in any party’s primary, regardless of whether the candidate is a member of that party or not, and regardless of what party officers think about the candidate.
Current law says candidates can’t run in the primary of parties they are not a member of, unless that party’s leaders give permission. Thanks to Mark Dunlea for this news.
It’s a bit like the current “Opportunity to Ballot” law in New York State, which allows members of other parties to compete in a party’s primary. It’s only been used on a small scale as far as I’ve seen.
It seems to me that this one won’t get far because it takes power away from party (even minor party) leaders and it might often be seen as “raiding” another party.
“It seems to me that this one won’t get far because it takes power away from party (even minor party) leaders and it might often be seen as “raiding” another party.”
I understand this can happen. But, after doing 8 years of minor party petitioning, I would think it would be difficult for a non-party candidate to do the grassroot work to get enough signatures.
OTB petitions for all offices in every nominating election — especially party officers and NYS Supreme Court judicial nominating convention delegates.
#2, the signature requirement for parties like the Greens and WFP are extremely low so it wouldn’t require that much work. Even the Conservative and Independence Party numbers wouldn’t be that high. I’ve seen it here in the Mid-Hudson several times with the Opportunity to Ballot. If Wilson-Pakula were gone it would likely become more widespread, no?
#4-In NYC, the over 3,500 members of the 5 county committees and the 82 members of the executive committee has the ground. It would be hard for non-party candidates to get signatures from a very active membership. But if there was an IP primary, in NYC it would be open to 860,130 voters, 109,520 IP members and 759,610 “blanks”. We allow “blanks” or no party preference, to vote in our primary.
there is a big difference between say an IPNY state executive committee granted Pilson Pakula to one of the major party candidates having their name on the OTB ballot and a pure OTB primary without any named Wilson Pakula authorized candidate —
I always bet on OTB.