At approximately 1 a.m. April 25, Saturday, U.S. District Court Judge Terrence Berg issued an order, again cutting the number of signatures for Michigan primary petitions by 50%.  The state had tried to persuade him to reconsider.  Esshaki v Whitmer, e.d., 2:20cv-10831.

See this story.  The judge wrote in his 16-page order, “The State asserts that the reduction in signatures is ‘an unprecedented disruption to the established and traditional process for candidates to gain ballot access in Michigan.’  The Court invited the State during oral argument to substantiate this assertion, but it was unable to do so.”

As already reported, a U.S. District Court Judge cut the number of signatures for Michigan primary candidates early this week, and then the state filed a request for reconsideration, saying he didn’t really need the relief, so the decision should be altered to no longer cut the number of signatures.  The state said it knows he didn’t need the relief because he turned in approximately 1,200 signatures.

On April 24, the lead plaintiff, Eric Esshaki, who needed 1,000 signatures to get on the Republican primary ballot for U.S. House, filed a court document explaining that after he won the lawsuit, that got him so much publicity that many voters filled out the petition blank he had postally sent them and returned it to him.  So, when he submitted his petition, it had more signatures than he had expected.  Here is his interesting statement.  Many of the signatures returned to him were put in his home mailbox by persons driving by to help him, rather than going through the postal mail.  Unfortunately many of the signatures were invalid because people signed the petition as voters, but then didn’t fill out the bottom of the petition saying they were also the circulators.

On April 4, the Connecticut Libertarian Party filed a federal lawsuit over ballot access and other election law problems.  Libertarian Party of Connecticut v Merrill, 3:20cv-467.  It is assigned to U.S. District Court Janet C. Hall, a Clinton appointee who earlier had struck down the ban on out-of-state circulators.  Here is the Complaint.

In late March, the Connecticut Secretary of State had recommended that if a party is on the ballot for one statewide race, then for 2020 it should be deemed to be qualified for all partisan office.  But only the Governor can implement this idea, and so far he has refused to respond to the Secretary of State’s suggestion.  If he had accepted the Secretary’s idea, the Libertarian Party would not have needed to petition in 2020, because it polled over 1% for President in 2016 and also polled over 1% for Treasurer.

The lawsuit had a hearing on April 20, and the state agreed to settlement talks, which will be complete by May 4.  The lawsuit does not just challenge the need to petition in 2020, but in all years.  It also attacks the state law that says parties that received over 20% for Governor are listed on the voter registration form, but other qualified parties are not listed, and an applicant must write them in on the form.