The Sooner State Party, a party organized in just the state of Oklahoma, is hoping to qualify for party status this year. It needs 34,599 valid signatures by February 28. If it qualifies, it will be the first time that any third party that is not nationally organized will have been on the Oklahoma ballot.
The only other ballot-qualified third parties in Oklahoma history (since statehood in 1907) have been Prohibition, Socialist, Progressive, Farmer-Labor, American, Libertarian, Reform, and Americans Elect. Also the New Alliance Party in 1988 had presidential ballot status but not ballot access for other offices.
Third parties that were qualified in many states, but never qualified in Oklahoma, in the last fifty years, have been Constitution, Green, Natural Law, and No Labels. The reason Oklahoma has had so few minor parties has been its severe ballot access laws.
The Sooner State Party is centrist. Here is a news story about the party. Thanks to Independent Political Report for the link.
If the party fails to obtain enough valid signatures by the February 28 deadline, it is possible it could win a lawsuit against the early petition deadline. Oklahoma is in the Tenth Circuit. The Tenth Circuit said in 1988 in Rainbow Coalition v Oklahoma State Election Board that the old May 31 petition deadline is constitutional. However, the Tenth Circuit also suggested in Populist Party v Herschler, another 1988 case, that the Wyoming petition deadline of June 1 is likely unconstitutional. Oklahoma would defend its February 28 deadline by saying that the deadline is needed to give new parties their own primary. However, courts have said in decisions from Arkansas, Ohio, Tennessee, Nebraska, South Dakota, Idaho, and Nevada that early deadlines for new parties cannot be justified by any so-called state interest in putting new parties in primaries. Instead the states can provide that new parties nominate by convention, thus eliminating the need for an early petition deadline.