On September 12, the California Senate Elections Committee passed SB 696, the bill to make it illegal for any party to have “Independent” or “Independence” in its party name. The bill says that the American Independent Party must choose a new name by October 29, or all its registrations will be converted to independent voters. The vote was 4-1, with the “no” vote being cast by Senator Jim Nielsen, the only Republican on the committee.
The acting chair of the committee, Senator Connie Leyva, imposed a two-minute limit on witnesses. I was one of the two witnesses opposing the bill, but in two minutes it was not possible to explain that the bill violates due process. There are a dozen precedents that when an election law restricts political opportunity for minor parties or independent candidates, it cannot take effect in time for an upcoming election, if that election is fairly close in time. One of the best precedents is the January 7, 2014 decision of a U.S. District Court in Ohio, Libertarian Party of Ohio v Husted, s.d. The Westlaw cite is WL 11515569. In September 2013, the Ohio legislature passed a bill that removed all four of the state’s qualified minor parties from the ballot and said they could not be on in 2014 unless they submitted a petition of 1% of the last vote cast. The due date for that petition was July 2014. The U.S. District Court upheld the constitutionality of the new restriction, but said it could not be imposed for the 2014 election.
SB 696 will probably be signed into law in the third week of September, and it will take effect immediately upon being signed by the Governor. That leaves the American Independent Party with little more than a month to choose a new name. The party has no state convention planned for te remainder of the year.
The chair’s decision to impose a two-minute limit on all testimony was arbitrary and unnecessary, because the committee was only hearing two bills on September 12, and the other bill attracted few witnesses.
Senator RED communists at work in the CASSOR —
CA Soviet Socialist Republic.
—
PR and AppV and TOTSOP
If the American Independent Party does change its name, what will happen to the hundreds of thousands of registered voters now listed as AIP?
Wouldn’t they be automatically converted to the new name change?
Again –
How soon before ONLY the RED COMMUNIST DONKEY Party is on ALL CA ballots ??? — in CASSOR
See 1933-1945 nazi regime and olde 1917-1991 RED communist regimes in Europe — with their fraud *elections*.
“The chair’s decision to impose a two-minute limit on all testimony was arbitrary and unnecessary, because the committee was only hearing two bills on September 12, and the other bill attracted few witnesses.”
That’s because the Democrats are very gung-ho on passing & enacting this bill -to the point that they will limit any criticism or commentary on the legal/ethical merits on this bill, Richard -including yours.
It’s how corrupt political machines operate -especially California Democrats.
Ed, yes, they would automatically be changed to the new name.
Considering the CA AIP is so far to the right as to make the Republican Party look liberal by comparison, and since the AIP DID also nominate Trump in 2016 (besides having the mis-leading Party name!), I will be glad to see it “vaporized” out of the CA SOS’s “recognition”. More “NPP” voters for the remaining minor parties to recruit from (I see the Liberatarians being the biggest recipient!). On the other hand the AIP has been wanting to BE the CA “affiliate” of the “Constitution Party”, and if it changes its name to that, everyone is happy. There is no more misleading “American Independent” and the “Constitution Party” gets ballot status without even having to register voters. Win-Win all the way around!
Since there is a Constitution Party in California we’ll see how many voters re-register with that party in the next year so that (once and for all) we can see how many in the AIP really want to be in the Constitution Party.
Breaking News (5:00 PM-09/13/2019): The CA State Senate has just “concurred” in Assembly “amendments” to SB 696, and it will now go to the “Engrossing and Enrollments” Room before formal presentation to the Governor (which will probably occur either over the weekend or on Monday). Newsom has till 10/13 to sign this bill. Since the bill has an “Urgency Clause”, it will go into effect the second it is signed. The AIP will then have till 10/30/2019 to change its name, or lose it’s ballot status. Since they want to be a part of the “Constitution Party”, I don’t see why they don’t do that, and avoid a voter registration drive!
What IS the status of CA’s “Constitution Party” that you refer to? How many registered voters does it have? It is certainly NOT “ballot qualified” yet!
It has a few hundred registered voters.
In reality of course there’s no chance the AIP will become the Constitution Party. They have not been affiliated since 2008, and have personality conflicts with each other. The AIP and CP only had partial affiliation from 1992-2008, not before or since.
It’s quite unlikely any significant numbers of AIP registrants want to or will register with the CP. They already have that option, if they want to write it in. Hardly any do.
Question: If and when they have a name change, are they on the ballot automatically (with that new name) due to the state transferring all of their registered voters to that party? (Then over time their numbers will rise and fall depending on if people want to stay with them.)
Yes.
John McCready
You are in error as to when the bill goes into effect. SB696 become effective when chaptered by the Secretary of State and not the signing by the Governor.