The Maine legislative session for this year is over, and LD 231 did not pass. This is the bill to let independent voters vote in partisan primaries. Although it received affirmative votes in both houses of the legislature, afterwards it was placed on the Appropriations Table, which means it was held in abeyance until the state budget was passed.

The Maine legislature finalized the budget on July 19 and then went home for the year, and did not include money in the budget for the bill. It could theoretically pass next year.

On July 20, Larry Elder filed a lawsuit in Superior Court in Sacramento to get on the September 14 recall gubernatorial ballot. He had been excluded because he didn’t redact his Social Security number from his tax returns. Apparently this was an inadvertent error. His lawsuit argues that the Secretary of State had the authority to redact the number; alternatively, his failure to redact the number harms no one except himself. The lawsuit has a hearing July 21, Wednesday. Thanks to Frank Morano for this link, which is an interview with Elder, and which explains the situation near the beginning. UPDATE: here is Elder’s brief. Thanks to Thomas Jones for the link to the brief.