Ryan Cooper, who has been a correspondent for The Week for five years, and formerly worked for Washington Monthly, here criticizes U.S. ballot access laws.
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South Carolina Representative Dwight Loftis (R-Greenville) has introduced HB 3581. It would provide that the voter registration form should ask applicants about party membership. Then, it would permit parties to close their primaries so that only party members could vote in those primaries. However, it also recognizes the right of a party to let independent voters vote in its primaries, if the party notifies the state of its wishes.
The bill has nine co-sponsors, all Republicans. They are Alan Clemmons, Mike Burns, Bill Chumley, Bill Taylor, G. Murrell Smith, Adam Morgan, Josiah Magnuson, Bobby Cox, and Jeff Bradley.
Texas Representative Mike Lang (R-Eastland) has introduced HB 377. It would add a question about an applicant’s party registration on the Texas voter registration application. It would also provide that only party members could vote in primaries.
It would also make it illegal for registered party members to sign a petition for an independent candidate or a new party. A similar Arizona law was held unconstitutional in Campbell v Hull, 73 F Supp 2d 1081, in 1999. The only other state that ever had a law like that was Louisiana, but Louisiana repealed it in 1948.
The Texas bill is also faulty because it doesn’t acknowledge that a party has the right to invite independents to vote in its primaries. Instead it forces closed primaries, or closed conventions, on all parties.
Effective with the 2020 election, Texas will no longer have a straight-ticket device, thanks to a bill that passed in 2017. However, State Senator Borris L. Miles (D-Houston) has filed a bill to keep the device for all future elections. It is SB 359. So far, it has no co-sponsors.
On January 15, the Virginia House Privileges and Elections Committee defeated SB 1002 by a vote of 11-3. It would have let each U.S. House district elect its own presidential elector, as is done in Maine and Nebraska. The author was Senator Amanda Chase (R-Midlothian).
A similar bill is pending in the House, although it would amend the state constitution. It is HJR 627, by Delegate Mark Cole (R-Fredericksburg).