On July 11, several minor parties filed a lawsuit against the Texas ballot access laws that pertain to minor parties and independent candidates. Miller v Doe, s.d., 1:19cv-700. The case concerns the new hurdles imposed on minor parties by the 2019 session of the legislature (filing fees for parties that nominate by convention), but also on the old hurdles that have existed for decades in Texas. UPDATE: here is a news story about the lawsuit, based on a press release issued by the plaintiffs.

The parties that are challenging the filing fee are the Libertarian and Green Parties. The parties that are challenging the ballot access petition are the Constitution Party and America’s Party of Texas. The case is assigned to U.S. District Court Judge Robert Pitman, an Obama appointee.

On July 8, the California Assembly passed SB 505. It requires presidential primary candidates to file if they want to be on a California presidential primary, and to fulfill certain fairly easy requirements. Here is the text of the bill.

Although the bill already passed the State Senate, it must return there, because the version of the bill that passed the Senate was somewhat different than the version that passed the Assembly.

On July 9, Rocky De La Fuente asked a U.S. District Magistrate to suspend his opinion in De La Fuente v Hobbs, until the Ninth Circuit issues its decision in De La Fuente v Padilla. On June 11, 2019, the U.S. District Magistrate in Arizona had upheld the Arizona independent presidential petition requirement of approximately 37,000 signatures. Except for Ralph Nader in 2008, no one had used the Arizona statewide independent procedure since 1992.

Meanwhile, the Ninth Circuit had heard oral argument in De La Fuente v Padilla on March 12, and still hasn’t issued its opinion. This is the California case against the independent presidential petition. Both Arizona and California are in the Ninth Circuit, so whatever the Ninth Circuit says about the California petition is likely to be pertinent to the Arizona petition. Here is the Arizona filing of July 9, 2019.