Filing for the Washington state primary closes on Friday, May 18. So far four candidates have filed for that seat. One of them is Dave Saulibio, whose ballot label will be “Trump Populist Party.” See this story. Washington lets any candidate choose any partisan ballot label that is no more than 15 characters and is not obscene.
On May 17, a Montana state trial court took testimony in the lawsuit on whether the Green Party had enough valid signatures on its March 2018 petition. See this story. The trial has not finished and will start again on May 24.
On May 17, attorneys for Maine filed this 24-page brief in Maine Republican Party v Dunlap, 1:18cv-179. The lawsuit had been filed earlier this month by the Republican Party, which argued that its freedom of association rights means that the party ought to be free to avoid using ranked choice voting.
The Maine government brief notes that the Republican Party uses a form of ranked choice voting at state conventions, to choose party officers. See page 10. The government brief also has a scholarly footnote 7, mentioning instances from approximately 100 years ago when states required parties to use ranked choice voting in their primaries.
This animated feature film is from the Maine Secretary of State’s web page. It attempts to explain the system to people who aren’t already familiar with it.
On May 7, the city council of St. Louis Park, Minnesota, voted to use ranked choice voting for the city’s elections, starting in 2019. St. Louis Park has a population of 45,000 and is near Minneapolis.
