Ann Ravel, a former Federal Election Commissioner, says here that the Commission on Presidential Debate should ease access to the debate stage. Her op-ed is carried on Real Clear Politics.
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On February 19, the Alaska Supreme Court heard arguments in Meyer v Alaskans for Better Elections, S17629. The issue is whether the initiative for a top-four system violates the state constitutional provision that initiatives must deal with a single subject.
The top-four initiative includes a plan to abolish party nominees. Instead, all candidates for congress and state office would run in the August primary, and then only the top four vote-getters would be on the general election ballot.
The initiative also says that the November ballot (but not the primary) should use ranked choice voting.
Finally, it says that campaign contributions must be reported within 24 hours of the receipt of the contribution.
The state elections office believes the initiative is invalid because campaign finance is a different subject that abolishing party nominees. See this story about the hearing.
On February 24, the U.S. Court of Appeals, D.C., will hear Level the Playing Field v Federal Election Commission, 19-5117. This is the case over whether the Commission on Presidential Debates is violating federal campaign law by setting the rules for general election presidential debates so as to make it inevitable that only the Democratic and Republican nominees will ever qualify. The three judges who will hear the case are now known. They are Gregory Katsas, a Trump appointee; Cornelia Pillard, an Obama appointee; and A. Raymond Randolph, a Bush Sr. appointee.
The hearing is at 9:30 am, and the panel only has two cases that day. However, each side only has ten minutes to argue.
The U.S. Supreme Court will hear two cases involving the rights of presidential electors this term. The Washington state case is Chaifalo v Washington, and the Colorado case is Colorado Department of State v Baca. The briefs of the presidential electors are due March 2, and the briefs of the states of Washington and Colorado are due April 1. After the briefs are in, the court will set a hearing date.
On February 20, James R. Adams submitted his main brief in the U.S. Supreme Court in Carney v Adams, 19-309. This is the case in which Adams is challenging a provision of the Delaware Constitution that says the only persons who are eligible to serve on most of the state courts are members of a party that has registration of at least 5%. The lower courts had struck down the Delaware rule, and then the state appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court and the Court agreed to hear it.
Adams is a registered independent.