On November 15, the Florida Secretary of State filed notices of appeal in two election law cases. One is the case on the order of candidates on the general election ballot. The other is the case on whether ex-felons who are unable to pay court fines, costs, and restitution may register to vote. Neither case has an Eleventh Circuit case number yet. They are Jacobson v Lee, and Jones v DeSantis. Thanks to Thomas Jones for this news.
Public Policy Polling has taken a poll in New York state on whether the state should make it more difficult for parties to be ballot-qualified. The results are that 64% are opposed; 25% are in favor; and 10% are undecided. See this story.
The proposal, pushed by some leaders of the Democratic Party, would increase the number of votes for a group to be a qualified party, from 50,000 votes for Governor, to 150,000.
The Louisiana Secretary of State’s web page is reporting election returns for the November 16 election as the votes are counted. See here. Toggle back and forth between the statewide races and the legislative races.
The Independent Party representative, Roy Daryl Adams, has won re-election with 54% of the vote against his Republican opponent, in the 62nd district.
On November 5, 2019, Bob Goodrich was elected Township Supervisor in Osceola Township, Tioga County. He is the state chair of the Constitution Party of Pennsylvania. He was on the ballot as the Constitution Party nominee and received 170 votes. A Republican ran a write-in campaign against him but only received 21 votes.
UPDATE: the Constitution Party also re-elected two members to the Duchesne, Utah city council, Jason Baker and Bryce Hamilton. That election was non-partisan.
On November 15, U.S. District Court Judge Mark E. Walker struck down the Florida law that says the candidates listed first on the general election ballot, for partisan races, will be the nominees of the party that won the last gubernatorial election. Jacobson v Lee, n.d. 4:18cv-262.
The 74-page opinion gets to the merits on page 26. The first 26 pages clear away procedural objections to the lawsuit, which was filed by the Democratic Party last year.
The opinion merely says that the existing law is unconstitutional, and does not tell the state how to change it. The opinion suggests that putting candidates on the ballot in alphabetical order would be easier, administratively, than rotating names.
Footnote 21 lists the states that do not give one particular party an advantage relating to ballot order, and has citations to the laws of each of those states.
The opinion does not suggest in any way that only the Democratic Party nominees should benefit from the ruling. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the news and the link.
