On August 11, Evan McMullin spoke at the Iowa State Fair, at the “Political Soapbox.” See this story. He said he will run for some public office in the future. McMullin was an independent candidate for president in 2016, and polled 731,733 votes even though he was only on the ballot in eleven states.
The Intercept has this excellent article about Democrats who complain about the Green Party running candidates in close elections, and yet who refuse to support any efforts for the cure. It focuses on the August 7 special congressional election this year in Ohio, and also the 2016 presidential election. The Intercept is an on-line news source established in 2014. The piece is by Briahna Gray, Senior Politics Editor of The Intercept, and reporter Zaid Jilani. Thanks to Rob Richie for the link.
The Maryland State Board of Elections announced on August 10 that independent candidate Neal Simon has enough valid signatures to be on the ballot for U.S. Senate. The requirement is 10,000 signatures; Simon submitted 17,000. See this story.
Simon is one of the nineteen candidates backed by Unite America (formerly the Centrist Project). He is also the first statewide independent candidate to take advantage of the 2017 liberalization of the ballot access law, which lowered the number of signatures from 1% of the registered voters (approximately 45,000 signatures) to exactly 10,000 signatures. That change was prompted by a lawsuit, Dorsey v Lamone, which received financial support from COFOE (the Coalition for Free & Equal Elections).
On August 10, the U.S. Court of Appeals, D.C. Circuit, said it will hear Libertarian National Committee v Federal Election Commission, 18-5227, on Friday, November 30, at 9:30 a.m. All eleven full-time U.S. Court of Appeals judges will participate.
This is the case over whether the Constitution protects the ability of a political party to receive an unlimited donation if the donor is deceased and had not told the party before he or she died that the bequest had been made.
The Libertarian brief is due September 12; the government’s brief is due October 12; the reply brief is due October 26.
As Washington election officials continue to tally more votes from the August 7 primary for U.S. House, 2nd district, the identity of the second-place finisher has changed twice. Votes posted on Friday, August 10, now show the Libertarian Party candidate, Brian Luke, in second place. Whoever places second will appear on the November ballot under the top-two system.
Here are the results as of the end of the day, August 10. Luke has 11,738; independent Gary Franco has 11,664; a Democrat has 11,602; and the Republican, Mike the Mover, has 11,249.
If Luke does eventually take second, that will be the first time that any minor party candidate has ever placed first or second in a top-two election, when there was also a Republican and a Democrat in the same race. It will also be the first time that a minor party candidate for U.S. House has appeared on the November ballot in Washington, since the state started using top-two in 2008.
