Nine Hawaii State Senators are sponsoring SB 954, to provide for a top-two system. The bill is badly worded. It says that it applies to all elective office, which implies that it includes president. Yet Hawaii doesn’t have a presidential primary, and the bill doesn’t provide for a presidential primary.

Also, the bill does not redefine “political party”. Existing law defines parties in terms of the vote for their nominees. Because there are no party nominees in a top-two system, none of the state’s political parties would be able to meet the vote test, because no party would have any nominees.

Also, the bill’s sponsors don’t understand that top-two systems are unconstitutional unless the ballot language on party labels has wording to tell voters that the party name doesn’t mean the candidate is a party nominee. That is why the California and Washington ballots put “prefers” or “party preference: (whatever)” on the ballot next to the name of each candidate.

The Ninth Circuit will hear De La Fuente v Wyman, 18-35208, on April 11, Thursday, at 9 am, in Seattle. This is the case over Washington state’s procedures for independent presidential candidate ballot access. De La Fuente won in U.S. District Court against the law that says no independent presidential candidate may petition without running an ad in a newspaper at least ten days before starting. The ad must say where the petitioning will occur. The state is trying to get the U.S. District Court decision overturned.

Liz Mair has this article in The Bulwark, gathering facts that rebut the common assumption about “spoilers” in recent U.S. presidential elections. The Bulwark is a new on-line opinion journal that inherited much of the staff of The Weekly Standard.