On November 26, U.S. District Court Judge Mark Walker refused to stay his own order, concerning the order of candidates on Florida general election ballots. So far the state has not asked the Eleventh Circuit for a stay. Thus, so far, the 2020 ballot will give Democrats an equal chance to have the top line, relative to Republicans.
In the Eleventh Circuit, the case is now known as Jacobson v National Republican Senatorial Committee, 19-14621.
Bill Weld and Rocky De La Fuente both complied with the Alabama election law, to gain a place on the 2020 Republican presidential primary. They both submitted 500 valid signatures, and paid the $15,000 filing fee set by the party. Nevertheless, their spot on the ballot is being challenged on the basis that they have both been members of other parties in the past. Weld was a Libertarian in 2016, and De La Fuente was a Democrat. The State Republican Party Executive Committee is holding a meeting on Sunday, December 8, to consider the challenge.
Of course, President Donald Trump has in the past been a member of other parties also. He was a member of the Independence Party in 2000. And he was a registered Democrat some years ago. UPDATE: De La Fuente spoke to the Republican Executive Committee in person, and the Committee then voted to keep him on their ballot. No news has reached me about Weld.
City and State here interviews Gerard Kassar, the state chair of the New York Conservative Party. Kassar believes that the lawsuit now pending in state court in Niagara County will result in a decision that the Public Funding Commission has no authority to change state election laws. Kassar also noticed that the nine Commissioners didn’t even take an oath of office.
The lawsuit has an oral argument on December 12, Thursday.
On December 6, the U.S. House passed HR 4, the bill to update the pre-clearance part of the Voting Rights Act. In 2013 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the old pre-clearance rules were so out-of-date, they could not be enforced.
If there were at least 15 instances in a single state when a local government had committed a voting rights violation in the last 25 years, then that state would be subject to having its election law changes pre-cleared by the U.S. Justice Department. Or if the state itself had committed a voting rights violation, and there were also nine or more instances when a local government in that same state had also done so, all in the last 25 years, then that state would also be under pre-clearance.
All Democrats in the U.S. House voted for HR 4, but only one Republican, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, voted for it. The lone independent voted against the bill. Here is a description of the bill.
The old Voting Rights Act was not very helpful against restrictive ballot access laws. Generally when a state that was under pre-clearance made its ballot access laws more severe, the federal Justice Department approved the changes. The Justice Department did stop Mississippi from increasing its statewide independent petition in 1966 from 1,000 signatures to 10,000 signatures. Also when Alabama in 1982 increased the vote test for a party to stay on the ballot from zero votes to 20%, the Justice Department stopped Alabama from enforcing the new law for the 1982 election.
Delegates to the Oklahoma Libertarian Party state convention have voted 17-13 for a closed primary for 2020. In Oklahoma, the election law lets each party decide for itself whether to let independents vote in the primary. Thanks to Chris Powell for this news.
