Alaska U.S. House member Don Young died March 18. According to this story, state law requires a special primary within three months of the death, followed by a special general election.

The top-four system, passed in November 2020, will be used for the special election. That will be the first time that it has been used.

It is somewhat plausible that the special primary will be June 16 and the special general election will be August 16. The regularly-scheduled primary is also August 16.

That will mean that on August 16, Alaska voters will use ranked-choice voting for the special general election, but they will not use ranked choice voting for the regularly-scheduled primary. For some reasons, the top-four backers wrote their initiative to use ranked choice voting in the general election, but not the primary.

Don Young was a Republican who was known for getting along with Democrats in Congress and working in a bipartisan fashion. It will be ironic if he is replaced by a more partisan Republican. Supporters of top-four systems insist, with no evidence, that top-four systems produce more moderate, centrist politicians.

The Idaho primaries are May 17. This year, two individuals filed for the Idaho Libertarian nomination for Governor, so election officials will print up Libertarian primary ballots. When parties have no contested primaries, no primary ballots are prepared. It is believed 2022 will have the first actual Idaho Libertarian primary ballots.

Here is the candidate list. The qualified parties in Idaho are Republican, Democratic, Libertarian, and Constitution.

Here is a newspaper story about the 2022 Idaho Libertarian primary.

The Indiana legislature adjourned on March 9. The entire 2022 legislative session only passed two bills relating to election law. One makes it illegal for local governments to accept private donations intended to help that local government with election administration; the other relates to electronic poll books.

The ballot access bill, which has been introduced every session for the last five sessions, failed to make any headway.