On June 19, the Rhode Island Senate passed SB 2612. It says that presidential primary candidates, and presidential candidates in the general election, must file their federal income tax returns with the state elections office. The vote was 34-3. But, leaders of the House say the bill will not be brought up this year in the House, so it won’t pass.
The case against the worst ballot access law in the nation, the Georgia law concerning independent and minor party candidates for U.S. House, is proceeding in U.S. District Court. The case is Cowen v Kemp, n.d., 1:17cv-4660. A great deal of discovery is underway, so the case is taking longer than some other types of cases. All the briefs will be submitted by October 8, 2018, so no matter the outcome, there will be no decision in time for the 2018 election.
Both houses of the California legislature have passed bills making it illegal for anyone to pay petitioners on a per-signature basis. The Assembly passed AB 1947 on April 30, and the Senate passed SB 1394 on May 31. The two bills are similar, but not identical.
On June 21, the North Carolina State Board of Elections removed three Constitution Party nominees from the ballot, because they had run in major party primaries for the same office in May. Two are running for county office, and one for the State House of Representatives. Two had run and lost Republican primaries, and one had lost a Democratic primary.
Rick Hasen’s election law blog has a copy of the letter from the State Board, and Hasen also added commentary that the action was brazen and perhaps without precedent. This is because when the party nominated the candidates on June 16, there was no “sore loser” law affecting minor party candidates. The law forbidding such candidacies didn’t exist until June 20, the day the legislature overrode the Governor’s veto of SB 486.
The party will sue to restore ballot position for these three nominees.
The North Carolina Green Party, the other party that nominates by convention, will hold its nominating convention June 23.
Steve Goodale has written this piece for Newsgrowl, to learn and reveal why New York polling companies have not been including Howie Hawkins and Larry Sharpe in their gubernatorial polls. Hawkins is the Green nominee, and Sharpe is the Libertarian nominee. The real answer seems to be that the polling companies take orders from their news media customers as to whom to include.
