On April 16, the Eighth Circuit heard arguments in Moore v Thurston, 18-1382. The issue are various Arkansas deadlines relating to independent candidates (for office other than president). The case had been filed in 2014 and this is the second time it has been argued in the Eighth Circuit. UPDATE: here is a link to the audio of the 32-minute argument.
On January 25, 2018, the U.S. District Court ruled the March 1 petition deadline unconstitutional, and said that the plaintiff, Mark Moore, who was running as an independent in 2018 as well as in 2014, would be permitted to file his petition “on or before May 1, 2018.”
The 2019 session of the legislature then passed HB 1152, moving the non-presidential independent deadline to May 1. But the legislature did not change the deadline for independent candidates to file a declaration of candidacy, which now became several months earlier than the petition deadline.
The state appealed the U.S. District Court order, arguing that the District Court should not have permitted Moore to file his 2018 petition, because he had not filed a declaration of candidacy several months earlier. The state wants the Eighth Circuit to rule that the U.S. District Court should not have given this relief, because Moore’s original complaint had not challenged the declaration date. But of course, when Moore filed this case back in 2014, the declaration deadline and the petition deadline were on the same day, and he could not have predicted that the legislature would create separate deadlines for those two duties.
It appears likely that the Eighth Circuit will rule that the case is moot. If that happens, it would be up to future lawsuits to determine if the declaration of candidacy deadline for independent candidates is too early. The three judges on the Eighth Circuit panel are James Loken, Roger Wollman, and David Stras.