On Saturday, August 4, both houses of the North Carolina legislature overrode the gubernatorial veto of SB 3. That is the bill that says judicial candidates, who normally have their party of registration listed on the ballot, cannot have a label if they switched parties during the three months before the filing deadline.

There are no party nominees for judicial races. There are no primaries for judicial office in 2018. The party labels merely inform the voters of how that judicial candidate is registered.

There will probably be litigation over the state’s policy of giving party labels to some candidates, but not others. More than a single judicial candidate is affected by the new law, which only came into existence after candidate filing had closed.