This news story concerns Angela Pence, the Libertarian nominee for U.S. House in Georgia’s 14th district U.S. House race. She needs about 23,000 valid signatures and has 4,000 so far. The deadline is in mid-July. As the article explains, no minor party candidate for a regularly-scheduled U.S. House election has ever appeared on the ballot since before 1943, the year the current law was passed.

The article does not say that the lawsuit against that law is still alive. Nor does it mention the fact that two Georgia precedents say that when the petition period is shorter than usual, due to late redistricting, the requirement must be relaxed.

On April 26, the New York State Court of Appeals heard Harkenrider v Hochul, the case over New York’s U.S. House redistricting. Here is a New York Times article about the oral argument. It seems the outcome is difficult to predict. The lower state courts had ruled against the current maps.

On April 24, the Rhode Island Libertarian Party held its state convention and nominated Joel Hellmann for Governor. Although the Libertarian Party has been on the ballot in every state’s gubernatorial election at least once, the Rhode Island Libertarian Party had not run anyone for Governor since 1976.

The Libertarian Party has never been a qualified party in Rhode Island. It will need 1,000 signatures to place Hellman on the ballot. If he should receive 5%, the party would become qualified for the first time. Hellmann was the Moderate Party’s candidate for Lieutenant Governor in 2018, and he polled 11,332 votes, 3.12%.