New York State Senator James Skoufis (D-Cornwall) has introduced S 1819, which would move the presidential primary to the fourth Tuesday in June. That is the same date as the primary for non-presidential office. The 2020 New York presidential primaries were also held in late June, but that was considered a temporary situation, because of the health crisis. The statute says the primary should be in February. Thanks to FrontloadingHQ for this news.
The Peoples Party has filed to be a political body in California. In California, a “political body” is an unqualified party that will attempt to become a qualified party. Groups that wish to be political parties must persuade approximately 68,000 people to fill out a new voter registration form showing themselves as members of that group.
The Peoples Party earlier had filed similar paperwork in Maine, which requires 5,000 registrations for party status.
The U.S. Supreme Court will consider whether to hear Kopitke v Bell, 20-897, at its February 19 conference. This is the challenge to the North Carolina petition deadline for independent presidential candidates, which was moved to March 3 in 2018. It is expected that am amicus in support of the candidate will be filed soon.
Ohio initiative proponents have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear Thompson v DeWine, the case over ballot access for initiatives during the health crisis. The case doesn’t have a case number yet, but here is the cert petition. The lower courts had denied any relief from Ohio’s initiative petition procedures last year.
On February 2, New York city used ranked choice voting to fill the vacancy in the city council, 24th district. There were eight candidates on the ballot. However, one candidate, James Gennaro, polled almost 60% of the first-choice votes, so there will be no need to count any further rounds. See this story. Thanks to Richard Grayson for the link.
