On March 5, the Kentucky House passed HB 325 by 92-4. Existing law lets voters change parties just a few weeks before a primary, if they wish to vote in their new party’s primary. The bill says that no one can vote in a primary unless he or she had been continuously registered in that party since December 31 of the year before the primary. Voters who had not been registered on December 31 of the year before the primary are exempt, of course, but once they register in the election year, they must remain in that same party if they wish to vote in its primary that year.

Kentucky law still doesn’t acknowledge that parties are free to decide to invite independents to vote in their own primaries, per the U.S. Supreme Court decision Tashjian v Republican Party of Connecticut.

The only House members who voted “no” are four Democrats: Jeffrey Donohue, Cluster Howard, Dennis Keene, and Josie Raymond. Assuming this bill becmes law, Kentucky will be the second-most restrictive state in the nation, concerning when voters may switch parties and vote in their new party’s primary. Only New York will have a more severe time period.

Utah elects a state school board from districts. Those elections are non-partisan. A few years ago the law was changed to say those elections are “partisan”, but that law was not specific. Utah State Senator Ann Millner (R-Ogden), a supporter of partisan school board elections, has introduced SB 236, to reword the existing law in a more coherent fashion.

Meanwhile, the original law switching school board elections to non-partisan elections has been challenged as being unconstitutional. The case is pending in the Utah Supreme Court. The Utah Constitution says no employee of the public school system shall ever be treated differently because of that employee’s partisan affiliation. The challengers argue that provision makes partisan elections for school board unconstitutional. Defenders of partisan elections say the state constitution is referring to employees, not school board elected members.

Florida Senator Jose Rodriguez and two other Senators have introduced SB 1386. Among other things, it provides that the Secretary of State will prepare a statewide layout for ballots. Currently each county designs its own ballot layout.

In November 2018, Broward County’s ballot put U.S. Senator and U.S. House at the bottom of the left-most column, underneath a large area that contained voting instructions. Then, at the top of the middle column, were the gubernatorial candidates, followed by less important offices. Thousands of Broward County voters didn’t see the U.S. Senate and U.S. House races that were at the bottom of the first column. Their eyes glazed over the first column, so they never noticed they were not voting for the congressional races.

If the bill is signed into law, the Secretary of State’s layout will be used in all counties. Presumably the Secretary of State’s office will pay better attention to good design than Broward County did in 2018.