The Utah Debate Commission is a consortium of academic and media organizations. Starting in 2014, it has sponsored debates for statewide office and congress. It has generally excluded any candidates except Republican and Democratic nominees, by requiring a showing of 10% in polls before letting a candidate debate. But it has agreed to include Eric Eliason, the nominee of the United Utah Party, in its U.S. House debate, First District. That debate will be October 17.
On September 7, U.S. District Court Judge Mark Walker issued a 27-page order in Rivera Madera v Detzner, n.d., 1:18cv-152. The issue is whether 32 particular Florida counties should have provided ballots in both English and Spanish, instead of just English. Because the election is so close, the judge denied the request of the plaintiffs for bilingual ballots. But he ordered that the 32 counties publish Spanish-language ballots on their websites.
His order starts with this paragraph, “Here we are again. The clock hits 6:00 a.m. Sonny and Cher’s “I Got You Babe” starts playing. Denizens of and visitors to Punxsutawaney, Pennsylvania eagerly await the groundhog’s prediction. And the state of Florida is alleged to violate federal law in its handling of elections.” A footnote to that paragraph says, “Phil Connors, portrayed by Bill Murray, experienced a similar phenomenon. Groundhog Day (Columbia Pictures Corp. 1993).”
On September 6, an Arkansas trial court removed Measure One from the ballot. It deals with tort reform and was put on the ballot by the legislature. The judge found the measure violates the single-subject rule. See this story.
On September 6, an Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll was released for the Georgia gubernatorial race. It suggests that no one will get a majority, because there are three candidates on the ballot, and each major party nominee is at 45%. If no one gets a majority, Georgia will hold a run-off afterwards. Thanks to Political Wire for the link.
On September 6, a New York poll was released that listed every candidate for Governor. It was taken August 29-30 and is based on responses from 2,783 voters. It suggests that both the Serve America Movement and the Libertarian Party will poll at least 50,000 votes, which would cause them to become qualified parties. Thanks to Frank Morano for the link. The poll was conducted by Liberty Opinion Research.
