On October 17, the State Journal-Register, daily newspaper for Springfield, endorsed Steve Dutner, the Libertarian nominee, for Secretary of State. See the editorial here. Thanks to Independent Political Report for this news. If Dutner gets at least 5% of the vote, the Libertarian Party will become ballot-qualified for statewide offices in 2020, and will be entitled to a presidential primary.
A U.S. District Court in Springfield, Illinois, will hear Gill v Scholz on Thursday, November 15, at 10 a.m. This is the case that challenges the independent U.S. House petition requirement, 5% of the last vote cast. The case was filed in 2016 and still doesn’t have a decision.
On October 25, the Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court agreed with the lower court, and kept the Democratic nominee for Amherst Town Clerk off the ballot. Cox v Spoth, 18-1945, 4th district. Here is the three-page opinion. The party nominated by party meeting, but the meeting should have involved the new Democratic town committee, and instead the nomination had been made by the old party town committee. Thanks to Joe Burhs for the link.
On October 26, the Illinois State Board of Elections filed this reply brief in Gill v Scholz, c.d., 3:16cv-3221. This is the case that challenges the Illinois 5% petition for independent candidates for U.S. House. All the briefs are now in.
Although the state relies on precedent, the state doesn’t mention the teaching of the U.S. Supreme Court in Storer v Brown, and Mandel v Bradley, that courts could consider how often a law is used, and if it is used very seldom, it is probably unconstitutional.
The political data research firm SEMrush set out to predict the winners of all U.S. Senate races this year, based on their research on Google searches for each candidate’s name. But they only bothered to do this research for Democratic and Republican nominees. In Maine this year, independent incumbent Angus King is expected to be re-elected, but because SEMrush didn’t check how many people googled his name, they made a prediction that Republican Eric Brakey will win. See this story in the Bangor Daily News. Thanks to Shawn Levasseur for the link.
