On September 3, U.S. District Court Judge John Sinatra, a Trump appointee, enjoined the May petition deadline for New York independent candidates. Meadors v Erie County Board of Elections, w.d., 1:21cv-982. The decision orders that the Board place independent candidate Byron Brown on the November ballot, as a candidate for re-election for Mayor. The ruling was oral and is not yet in writing. The judge said the burden of the May deadline is severe, and there is no compelling reason for a deadline that early.

The New York petition deadline for independent candidates had always been in August, September, or October of election years, in the entire history of government-printed ballots. Then, in 2019, the legislature moved it to May. UPDATE: also on September 3, in a parallel lawsuit in State Supreme Court, the petition deadline was also enjoined.

Many Republican Party officials in Wyoming have been working to change the primary system in time for the 2022 election, because they are opposed to the re-election of Liz Cheney (the state’s only U.S. House member). They are afraid that she will be renominated in the Republican primary in 2022 because many pro-Trump Republican candidates will split the anti-Cheney vote.

On September 2, the committee that hears election law bills, the Joint Corporation, Elections and Political Subdivisions Committee, heard testimony on changes. They heard from proponents of a top-two system, ranked choice voting, and traditional two-round primary runoffs. According to this story, none of these ideas is likely to pass in time for the 2022 primary. Thanks to FairVote for the link.

On September 2, the California Senate passed AB 446, which makes modest improvements in the procedure to qualify a new party. The only Senator who voted against the bill is Senator Jim Nielsen (R-Gerber). Ironically, back in 1979, in his first stint as a State Senator, he introduced a bill to greatly ease the law for new parties to get on the ballot. He did that on behalf of the American Party, which was a rival of the American Independent Party. It would have allowed any party to get on the ballot just by submitting a list of its officers and a copy of its bylaws, similar to the law now in effect in Florida and Mississippi.

AB 446 lowers the petition for a new party from 10% of the last gubernatorial vote, to 3%. This is a significant change, but it isn’t too meaningful because almost no group uses the petition procedure. Instead they almost invariably use the registration alternative, which requires members of .33% of the state registration total.