On February 20, Massachusetts Representative Solomon Goldstein-Rose changed his registration from Democratic to independent. Unlike many other legislators who leave one of the major parties, he intends to run for re-election as an independent this year. See this story.
On February 22, Rocky De La Fuente, an independent presidential candidate in 2016, won his lawsuit against a Washington state law that requires petitioning candidates for president to publish a notice in a newspaper, in each county in which the petition will be circulated, at least ten days in advance of beginning to petition. De La Fuente v Wyman, w.d., 3:16cv-5801. De La Fuente had been kept off the Washington ballot in 2016 because of this law, even though he submitted the required 1,000 signatures of registered voters. Here is the 13-page decision. The decision is by Judge Benjamin H. Settle, a Bush Jr. appointee.
The decision says the burden of running the notices is slight, but still strikes down the law because it does restrict voting rights to some extent and the state couldn’t show that the law is needed for any rational purpose. The decision says, “The present case illustrates how a minor party or independent candidate may be capable of mustering what the State considers to be a significant modicum of support — in this case the signed petitions of over 1,000 registered voters — yet still be excluded from the ballot for failing to give notice.”
The real harm the law does is effectively make the filing deadline earlier. Already Washington state had one of the earliest presidential independent petition deadlines (July 23) and the 10-day publication law make this deadline realistically July 13. Late-announcing candidates like Evan McMullin (who didn’t declare until August 8, 2016) are the type of candidate the law injured.
This is the first constitutional ballot access case any minor party or independent candidate has won in Washington since 2004, when the Libertarian Party won a decision in state court against the old law that required a minor party or independent candidate to poll at least 1% of the vote in the blanket primary. That win lost all significance after Washington state abandoned the blanket primary afterwards.
On September 22, 2017, the Seventh Circuit struck down the Illinois law requiring newly-qualifying parties to run a full slate of candidates. However, no Illinois legislator has introduced a bill to repeal that law, and the deadline for introducing bills this year has now passed. The State Board of Elections did not ask the legislature to introduce such a bill.
Thus Illinois joins the ranks of other states in which certain election laws have been struck down, but the legislature does not amend the statutes to take the decision into account. Other states with this characteristic at this time are Arkansas, Connecticut, Georgia, and especially Pennsylvania. When a state behaves this way, innocent would-be candidates and others read the election code to understand the law, but the election code misleads such individuals because it isn’t in sync with actual policy.
This Los Angeles Times story shows that the U.S. House race in California’s 49th district could end up with two Republicans on the November ballot, and no write-in space. Or it could end up with two Democrats, if certain other Democrats decide not to run. Or it could end up with one Democrat and one Republican. Thanks to California Politico for the link.
According to this story, Wyoming businessman David Dodson will be an independent candidate for U.S. Senate this year. He will need 5,036 valid signatures, not easy in Wyoming, which has the smallest population of any state.
