On November 4, Libertarian nominees for statewide partisan office carried counties in three states. In all cases, there was no Democrat in the race.
In South Dakota, the Libertarian nominee for School Commissioner, John English, carried Buffalo, Shannon, and Todd Counties. Also in South Dakota, Chad Haber, the Libertarian for Attorney General, carried Shannon and Todd Counties. Also, Kurt Evans, Libertarian nominee for Auditor, carried Shannon and Todd Counties.
In Missouri, Sean O’Toole, Libertarian nominee for Auditor, carried Kansas City. There were three candidates in the race, a Republican, a Constitution Party nominee, and O’Toole. Technically Kansas City isn’t a separate county, but for over a century Missouri election officials have treated it as a separate county when they prepare official election returns.
In Georgia, John Monds, Libertarian nominee for Public Service Commissioner, carried DeKalb, Hancock, and Fayette Counties. DeKalb is the third most populous county in the state. Thanks to Michael for this news.
California Green Party Leader in Lose Column
California Green Party spokesperson Mike Feinstein [Green] lost Santa Monica city council with less than 6.27% (#8 of 14) of the votes.
Spokesperson Mike Feinstein has been a strong voice and roadblock against the USA Parliament’s Unity Coalition, he’s been vocal against Top Two which guarantees winners to garner a minimum of 50% (plus one vote) and which James Ogle reports is good for coalition building.
James Ogle, 1994 Green Party gubernatorial candidate campaigning on pure proportional representation (PR) that year and for 19 consecutive years thereafter, won the Libertarian Party’s only state primary of Missouri which fell before their national convention in 2012 after campaigning for unity with Roseanne Barr. He won that primary with 52.7% of the votes.
Three United Coalition candidates have also won California State Assembly seats in 2014 in the November 4th Top Two elections.
The South Dakota Libertarian Party is celebrating a historic showing at the ballot box in 2014. Capitalizing on several two-way races, Libertarian candidates earned an unofficial total of approximately 170,000 votes on Tuesday, shattering the party’s previous record of 38,998 votes received in 1994.
State treasurer candidate Ken Santema of Aberdeen had impressive individual numbers, becoming only the third South Dakota Libertarian to earn more than 13,000 votes in a three-way race contested by both major parties.
As expected, candidates in the party’s first-ever statewide two-way races had even greater totals, highlighted by John English of Sioux Falls. Running for commissioner of school and public lands, English won three counties and became the first South Dakota Libertarian to receive more than 50,000 votes.
The 23.5 percent earned by English is just shy of the 25.4 percent received by the Democrat in the South Dakota governor’s race.
Kurt, will Libertarian and Constitution Party members in South Dakota actively seek a legislator to sponsor a bill to alter the unfair requirement that no one can run in a statewide minor party primary unless they submit a petition signed by 250 members of the party? That terrible law kept both parties from having a gubernatorial nominee this year, which means they both went off the ballot despite showing that they have a modicum of support. If anyone reading this wonders how the two parties had any nominees for any statewide office, the answer is that the less important statewide offices aren’t in the primary, and parties nominate by convention, so no ballot access problem for those lesser offices.
Richard points out another tool the Two Party Establishment will use to keep a 3rd party or Independent off the ballot. As I pointed out in another reply to another Post by Richard, I believe the Establishment pays people to sit up all night thinking of ways they can keep 3rd parties and Independents off the ballot. So far, they have done a pretty good job of accomplishing such.
This is understandable, especially when there is not a major party involved in the race.
Whether we want to admit it or not, most voters, “vote against” someone, rather then for someone. So when a 3rd party or Independent candidate happens to fill the “role” of the major party, they are naturally going to be the recipient of those “against” votes who otherwise would have been cast by the major party candidate supporters – had there been a major party nominee on the ballot.
In the case of John Monds, Libertarian nominee for Public Service Commissioner, who in a 3 way race carried DeKalb, Hancock, and Fayette Counties in Georgia, this is an example of the anomalies which occur and usually have specific reasons of explanation.
However, it can be said when there is a 3 way race, those votes earned by the 3rd party or Independent candidate are genuinely earned votes, even if those votes in numbers are actually small. Because these are votes which were cast by a voter who was not voting “against” the other party, but were cast because they liked what the 3rd party or Independent candidate had to say or the fact they were given a real choice of ideas in the election.
This simply reaffirms why the major parties – the Establishment parties – desire at any cost to keep us off the ballot.
its to bad the 20% required be a full party in Georgia can’t be applied to any statewide race 🙁
DonW:
The major parties write the election laws just so this doesn’t happen. Alabama – despite it’s overall unfairness – does allow a 3rd party to become a party within a county or other political jurisdiction less than statewide, if it has one candidate who polls the 20% of the vote in one race in that county or jurisdiction. Richard may have to correct me on this, but as he correctly pointed out in one of his post, the Constitution(al)Party of Alabama by the results of one candidate for a county office, has allowed the party to have full ballot position for the next two election cycles – 2016 and 2018.
We just need to continue to hammer away at the Legislatures and in the Courts until they finally give in to us, and give us ballot access equality.
My goal is that a filing fee for each candidate in lieu of signatures on petitions should be sufficient to obtain ballot position. Florida has this law, and they have dozens of candidates at practically every statewide and many local elections. Unfortunately, in Florida, the fees are steep, but I’ve always said, if a candidate is serious enough about running for office, he or she can somehow obtain the $5000 or so to run for the office. It’s a lot easier to raise or borrow $5000 than it is to collect 5,000 valid signatures.
Richard Winger asked:
>”Kurt, will Libertarian and Constitution Party members in South Dakota actively seek a legislator to sponsor a bill to alter the unfair requirement that no one can run in a statewide minor party primary unless they submit a petition signed by 250 members of the party?”
I’m not sure, Richard. Losing the Ryan Gaddy lawsuit really seemed to break the momentum for ballot-access reform.