On February 25, the 3-judge U.S. District Court that has been handling the Alabama lawsuit over U.S. House redistricting declined to let Republican candidate Jeff Coleman intervene in the case. The court had earlier ordered the legislature to redraw the U.S. House districts, and at that time the court had extended the filing deadline for primary candidates. But then the U.S. Supreme Court, five days later, had stayed the U.S. District Court order, without mentioning the filing deadline extension.

Jeff Coleman had filed his declaration the day before the new filing deadline, but because the new filing deadline was part of the order on the district boundaries, and that order had been set aside by the U.S. Supreme Court, that left the deadline unclear. Coleman then asked the 3-judge court to uphold the deadline it had chosen, but the court declined to do so. It says Coleman’s real dispute is with the Alabama Republican Party. The Secretary of State already said he will accept all candidacy declarations that the party approves. The Republican Party hasn’t accepted Coleman’s filing, but it hasn’t said yet for certain that it won’t. Here is the 10-page order. It says that even if the Republican Party had already clearly rejected Coleman, the court does not have the power to help him. See page nine.

On February 22, the Arizona House passed HCR 2015. It is a proposed constitutional amendment, to require initiatives to receive at least 60% of the popular vote in order to pass. If the legislature approves the bill, then the voters will vote on it, because it amends the state constitution.

The vote in the House was 31-28. The only state that already requires initiatives to receive 60% is Florida.

Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, the Biden choice for U.S. Supreme Court, has never handled a case involving voting rights of minor parties or independent candidates. That is not surprising, because federal judges in the District of Columbia almost never have such cases, except for campaign finance cases.