On May 15, Colorado Governor Jared Polis issued an executive order, permitting electronic signatures for initiatives. See this story. The order does not apply to candidate petitions.
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On May 15, the Virginia Constitution Party, the Virginia Green Party, and an independent U.S. House candidate filed a federal lawsuit against Virginia petition requirements. Constitution Party of Virginia v Virginia State Board of Elections, e.d., 3:20cv-349. It asks that the petition requirements be declared unconstitutional due to the health crisis. Here is the Complaint.
UPDATE: here is a newspaper story about the lawsuit.
Virginia requires presidential candidates to file 5,000 signatures by August 21, and congressional candidates to file by June 15. The state normally sets the independent non-presidential petition deadline on primary day, but this year the state moved the primary to June 23 but did not even bother to also extend the petition deadline.
The lawsuit includes a Green Party nominee for U.S. House. U.S. House candidates need 1,000 signatures.
The lawsuit is assigned to U.S. District Court Judge John A. Gibney, an Obama appointee. Thanks to Carey Campbell for the news.
The East Valley Tribune has this story about the Libertarian Party ballot access lawsuit in Arizona, which is now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. The Court has not said yet whether it will hear the case. It has not yet set a conference date to consider that. But the Court did show interest in the case, by asking the state to submit a response.
On May 14, the New York State Supreme Court, Appellate Division, agreed with the trial court that Assemblymember Rebecca Seawright should be on the Democratic primary ballot. She is running for re-election. New York state requires that all petitions include a “cover sheet”, which describes how many pages and how many signatures are in the attached petition. Despite long-standing strong precedent that cover sheets are required, the trial court, and now the mid-level court, have ruled in favor of Seawright, given the health crisis. She herself was quarantined during the period when the paperwork was due. See this story.
Here is the decision. Seawright v Board of Elections in the City of New York, 11603.
The New York City Board of Elections may appeal again, to the New York highest state court, the Court of Appeals.
Puerto Rico will hold a referendum in November 2020 that asks a single question, whether Puerto Rico should seek statehood. See this story. Although Puerto Rico has had past referenda on its future status, this is the first one that presents only a single question. Thanks to Thomas Jones for the link.