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.

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.

According to this article, at least fifty Democratic or Republican nominees for U.S. House this year have not spent as much as $5,000 on their campaigns. Of course, the vast majority of these major party nominees are probably members of the weaker of the two parties in their particular district. Nevertheless, this shows that candidates can find success in some instances, even for such a major office as U.S. House, without spending much money. Thanks to the Institute for Free Speech for the link.