On May 30, the Texas legislature adjourned for the year. The controversial bill to make various voting procedures more difficult failed to pass, SB 7, only because House Democrats slipped out of the legislative chamber, so that no quorum was met. See this story. Thanks to Thomas Jones for the link.
On May 29, the Nevada Senate Finance Committee passed AB 126, which sets up a presidential primary. The bill had already passed the Assembly.
On May 28, the Nevada Assembly Legislative Operations and Elections Committee passed SB 292. It makes ballot access for new and previously unqualified parties more difficult. It moves the petition deadline to late April, and imposes a severe distribution requirement. The petition would need to include approximately 3,400 signatures from each of the four U.S. House districts.
The Rhode Island Board of Elections has released the write-in tally for president from November 2020. The only three actual presidential candidates who received any write-ins were: Howie Hawkins (Green Party) 174; Kanye West (independent) 131; Brock Pierce (independent) 6.
Minor party and independent presidential candidates who were on the Rhode Island ballot were Jo Jorgensen, Brian Carroll (American Solidarity), Rocky De La Fuente (Alliance), and Gloria La Riva (Socialism & Liberation).
Rhode Island tallied all the presidential write-in votes, most of which were for famous people who were not running. The person who got the most write-ins was Bernie Sanders, who received 204. Thanks to Tony Roza for this information.
On May 26, proponents of Maine initiatives filed this brief in the First Circuit in We the People PAC v Bellows, 21-1149. This is the case over Maine’s ban on out-of-state circulators for initiatives. The U.S. District Court had invalidated the ban, and the state is trying to persuade the First Circuit to reverse the lower court.
