Texas Representative Lyle Larson (R-San Antonio) has introduced HB 1214, to move the Texas primary for president and all other office from March to January. No state in U.S. history has ever had its congressional primary so early as January.
Because Texas links its petition deadlines for new parties and non-presidential independents to the date of the primary, if this bill passed, non-presidential independent candidates would need to submit their petition by April 21. Newly-qualifying parties would be required to submit their petitions by April 10. Newly-qualifying parties would also be required to tell the Secretary of State of their intention to petition no later than October of the year before the election, and non-presidential independent candidates would need to file a declaration of candidacy in October of the year before the election as well. Thanks to Jim Riley for this news.
How soon before the robot party hack gerrymander MONSTERS have a primary election the day after each general election ???
The gerrymander TYRANTS are on the march — trying to get TOTAL PERMANENT control of various regimes — State regimes and the Devil City regime especially.
There really is no reason to tie the deadlines to the primaries. Texas forbids cross-over participation in nominating activities, whether by voting, attending a convention, signing a petition, or being a candidate.
The State’s only interest is knowing the candidates for the general election ballot by early September, and having time to process petitions. So a deadline of July 31, should be fine for all petitions.
There is no reason to require a declaration of independent candidacy 5 months before signatures can begin to be collected. A candidate in a primary can’t run as an independent, nor may a voter, and primary voters may not sign an independent petition. An independent candidate would have to file campaign finance reports once their funds become significant.
Similarly, there is no reason for declaration of candidacy for convention-nominating candidates. For primary candidates, the filing deadline is to permit ballots to be printed and be sent overseas. It is not smoke out potential opponents.
Currently, if there is a late withdrawal of a primary candidate, there is a short extension of a couple of days. A convention-nominating party is permitted to set its own deadline. In most cases, the extended deadline is 11:59 pm the night before the convention.
Early voting for the primaries is now conducted by the counties. This discriminates against the minor parties, and voters who wish to affiliate with the minor parties, particularly the elderly, the disabled, persons absent from the county, those serving in the military, and persons confined to jail. Voters should be able to affiliate with convention-nominating parties during early voting, and convention-nominating parties should be required to facilitate participation by those who are unable to attend in person.
Convention-nominating parties should be free to set their conventions at the time of their choosing. They should be permitted to combine their county and precinct conventions, just like the larger parties do.
We’re getting there.
The proposed law would require an initial filing 15 months before the start of the a 24-month term of office.
This is comparable to the gestation period for walruses and giraffes, but still short of that for elephants and whales.