Pennsylvania Now Says it Won’t Enforce Residency Requirement for Primary Petition Circulators

Posted on by June 20, 2018
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On August 21, 2017, U.S. District Court Judge John E. Jones III upheld Pennsylvania’s residency requirement for petitioners who circulate primary petitions. De La Fuente v Cortes, m.d., 1:16cv-1696. The judge said the law is needed to protect the associational rights of the Democratic and Republican Parties, because if out-of-state circulators were permitted for primary petitions, those circulators might not be members of the same party. De La Fuente then appealed that decision to the Third Circuit.

On June 18, 2018, the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s department wrote a letter to the Third Circuit, saying De La Fuente’s appeal should be dismissed because the state does not intend to enforce the residency requirement for primary petition circulators in the future.

North Carolina Senate Overrides Gubernatorial Veto of Bill that Imposes “Sore Loser” Law

Posted on by June 19, 2018
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On June 19, the North Carolina Senate overrode the gubernatorial veto of SB 486. The bill, which the Governor had vetoed on June 15, prevents new parties from nominating anyone who had earlier that year lost a primary for the same office.

The House will vote on the override on Wednesday, June 20.

In the meantime, the Constitution Party held its nominating convention on June 16 and nominated ten candidates, including three individuals who had lost major primaries for the same office in May. One candidate had run for a legislative seat, and two for county partisan office. Because the Constitution Party nominated these individuals at a time when there was no sore loser law, under due process tradition, they ought to be allowed to be Constitution Party nominees this year. However, the State Board of Elections is unwilling to say whether they will be allowed to run.

Arnold Schwarzenegger Defends California Top-Two System

Posted on by June 20, 2018
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Former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and California Congressman Ro Khanna have this op-ed, defending the California top-two system. It has appeared in the Washington Post, the Sacramento Bee, and the San Diego Union-Tribune.

Like some other defenders of the top-two system, Schwarzenegger and Khanna try to deceive readers into believing that California must choose between top-two, and a closed primary system. They do not mention that there are four other systems that do not restrict voter choice in November (as top-two does), and which still allow independent voters to vote in primaries.

Those systems are: (1) an open primary, used by 19 states, in which there is no such thing as registration into a party, and any voter can choose any party’s primary ballot; (2) a semi-closed primary, in which independent voters can choose any party’s primary ballot but party members are restricted to their own party’s primary ballot; (3) a blanket primary, in which all partisan candidates run on the same primary ballot and all voters used that ballot, but the top vote-getter from each party (plus any petitioning independents) appears on the November ballot; (4) the Louisiana system, in which there are no primaries.

Schwarzenegger and Khanna make it especially difficult for readers to understand that alternatives exist, because they use “open primary” to refer to the top-two system. Thus when anyone tries to explain the existence of a true open primary, confusion results.