SAM (Serve America Movement) is a new political party that recently won qualified status for itself in New York.  Its platform no longer includes any endorsement of a top-two system.  Here is the new platform language concerning ballot access.

Previously, the party’s platform on ballot access endorsed top-two systems.  The old platform said, “We believe that states themselves should sponsor non-partisan primary elections, in which all candidates, regardless of party, appear on the same primary ballot.  This could either be a top-two primary system, as in California and Washington state, or a top-four primary, as suggested by Katherine Gehl and Michael Porter in their review of the American political system earlier this year.”

On December 12, the Michigan House passed HB 6595, which makes it much more difficult to get statewide initiatives on the ballot.  It would provide that no more than 15% of the signatures could come from any particular U.S. House district.  It also requires the petition forms to say if the circulator is being paid, and requires each circulator to file his or her own affidavit, telling whether he or she was paid.  See this story.

On December 13, the Eleventh Circuit refused to rehear Hall v Merrill, 16-16766.  This is the case challenging the requirement that independent candidates for U.S. House in special elections need a petition of 3% of the last gubernatorial vote.  The U.S. District Court had struck down the requirement.  But the Eleventh Circuit had ruled that the case is moot, and therefore the precedent established by the U.S. District Court is erased, and if a future independent candidate challenges the same law, he or she must start an entirely new lawsuit.  The conclusion that such cases are moot contradicts many U.S. Supreme Court precedents.  The plaintiff plans to ask for U.S. Supreme Court review.