On June 20, Maine Governor Janet Mills signed LD 1977, an omnibus election law bill. Among other things, it lets each qualified party decide for itself if independent voters can sign a petition for a candidate to get on that party’s primary ballot.

This will help qualified minor parties to run candidates. Previously only registered members of a party could sign a petition to get a candidate on a primary ballot. Because all qualified parties must nominate by primary, and because the number of signatures to get on a primary ballot is quite high, it was very difficult for minor party members to get on their own party’s primary ballot. No Libertarian and no Green had ever been able to get on one of those party’s primary ballot for either U.S. Senate nor U.S. House. The law requires 2,000 signatures for statewide office, and 1,000 for U.S. House.

Parties that want independent voters to be able to sign primary petitions must notify the Secretary of State by December 31 of the year before the election.

Independent voters in Maine comprise 30% of all registered voters. In 2023, a bill to let independent voters sign primary petitions had failed to pass. That bill was LD 1320.

The same bill also provides that a qualified party can at any time voluntarily cancel its qualified status. After the bill took effect, No Labels took advantage of the new law to cancel its qualified status.

Also, the same bill provides that if a group attempting to qualify with a registration drive fails, it can ask the Secretary of State to preserve its registrants, so the drive doesn’t need to start all over again.