Texas held primaries on March 6 for Congress and partisan state and county office. Approximately 1,600,000 voters chose a Republican ballot, and approximately 1,060,000 voters chose a Democratic ballot, for a total of 2,660,000 primary voters.

Texas has 15,249,541 registered voters, so this is a turnout of approximately 17%. Texas almost always has one of the nation’s lowest turnout rates. Perhaps if the Texas primary were later in the year, turnout would be higher. The only other state with a March primary is Illinois, which holds its primaries this year on March 20. After that, no state has a primary earlier than May 8.

Six unqualified parties are now legally permitted to begin petitioning for a place on the general election ballot. Voters who voted in the primary cannot sign such petitions. Texas is the only state that bars primary voters from signing a petition to place a party on the general election ballot.

On March 7, Kansas State Senator John Doll said he is changing his registration from Republican to Independent. He represents southwest Kansas. He will be the Lieutenant Governor running mate for independent gubernatorial candidate Greg Orman. See this story. Doll has been in the legislature since 2012, and he was Mayor of Garden City before he was elected to the legislature.

The number of state legislators who have left the Democratic and Republican Parties in the last few years is probably higher now than at any time in the last one hundred years.

On March 6, the South Dakota Senate passed HB 1286. It makes some ballot access changes that are liberalizing, and some that are restrictive. The bill had already passed the House, but because the two versions differ, it must now return to the House.

It changes the non-presidential independent deadline from April to June. It lowers the number of signatures for a new party from 2.5% of the last gubernatorial vote, to 1%, and moves the deadline from March to July.

But it also says that new parties, and smaller qualified parties, must submit petitions for each of their nominees, even though there are no more primaries for new or small parties. Furthermore, even though it is worded very confusingly, it now appears that it eliminates the ability of small or new parties to nominate for the lower state executive positions by convention. The Secretary of State wrote an e-mail on March 5 to a newspaper reporter, saying the bill does not change the method by which small or new parties nominate for the lower executive positions. But on the floor of the Senate, the Senator handling the bill said it eliminates that method, and that now new and small party candidates for these offices must also submit petitions. The number of signatures is not clearly specified in the bill.