On January 25, the New Mexico House Judiciary Committee passed HB 55, the National Popular Vote Plan bill. That was the second committee that had passed the bill. The bill will probably receive a vote on the House floor on Monday, January 28.
Reply
On January 23, the Colorado Senate State, Veterans & Military Affairs Committee passed SB 19-42, the National Popular Vote Plan bill. The vote was party-line, with all Democrats voting “yes” and all Republicans voting “no.”
This makes the second state this month in which a National Popular Vote Plan bill has made some headway. The other state is New Mexico.
On January 24, the Tenth Circuit heard the Colorado case filed by 2016 presidential electors who were unseated when they didn’t initially vote for Hillary Clinton. Baca v Williams, 18-1173. Here is an Associated Press story about the hearing, although it doesn’t say anything about the reaction of the three judges.
The three judges were Mary Beck Briscoe, a Clinton appointee; Carolyn McHugh, an Obama appointee; and Jerome Holmes, a Bush Jr. appointee.
Arkansas State Senator Trent Garner (R-El Dorado) has introduced SB 163. It increases the petition requirement for new or previously unqualified parties in Arkansas from 10,000 signatures, to 3% of the last gubernatorial vote, which would be 26,746 signatures for 2020.
The Arkansas party petition was 3% of the last gubernatorial vote between 1977 and 2006, and in all those years, no group successfully completed the party petition. The Reform Party tried in 1996 and failed, but then went to court and won a lawsuit against that law, and was put on the ballot.
The legislature ignored the 1996 court decision, as to the number of signatures, so in 2006, the Green Party sued and won the new lawsuit. The legislature then lowered the petition requirement to 10,000 signatures. The 2006 case was Green Party of Arkansas v Daniels, 445 F.Supp.2d 1056.
Senator Garner is an attorney, so he should have known about the precedents. The bill has an emergency clause, saying “It is found by the General Assembly that the current laws concerning the signature requirement are insufficient to reflect the will of the voters of Arkansas.” This is an absurd statement, given that the only party that used the petition in 2018 was the Libertarian Party, which polled 2.90% for Governor, and for the two statewide races with no Democrat, polled 27.65% for Auditor and 29.11% for Treasurer. The Libertarian vote for Treasurer was 250,943 votes.
On January 24, the Delaware House passed HB 41, which moves the non-presidential primary from September to April. It also moves the deadline for a new party to qualify from August to early April. Parties get on the Delaware ballot by persuading approximately 700 voters to register into the party. Small parties nominate by convention, not primary, so there is no reason to move the qualification deadline just because the legislature desires an early primary for the major parties. The vote was 36-5.