Texas has been embroiled in lawsuits over its U.S. House and legislative districts, and its voter ID law for voting at the polls, for years. This Texas Tribune article explains the status of each set of lawsuits. Thanks to Electionline for the link.
Utah Representative Justin Fawson (R-North Ogden) has introduced HB 68. It would let parties decide whether or not to let candidates petition onto that party’s primary ballot. If parties don’t want to allow candidates to petition onto their primary ballot, then the only other way to get on a primary ballot would be for the candidate to make a strong showing in a party endorsements meeting. That was the law in Utah several years ago.
Ever since the petition alternative was added, the Utah Republican Party has been suing in federal court to eliminate the ability of candidates to petition onto the Republican primary ballot. The lawsuit, Utah Republican Party v Cox, 16-4091, is pending in the Tenth Circuit. The Utah Republican Party only wants candidates who do well in party meetings.
Utah Representative Bruce Cutler (R-Murray) is about to introduce a bill to abolish the straight-ticket device. The bill doesn’t have a bill number yet. Thanks to Electionline for this news.
The Centrist Project has changed its name to Unite America. It is a group that is grooming independent candidates to run for Congress and state legislatures in 2018 and beyond.
On January 4, Indiana State Senator Greg Walker introduced a bill to improve ballot access, SB 328. Here is the text of the bill. Currently the 2018 Indiana petition requirement for statewide independent candidates and nominees of unqualified parties is 26,700 signatures. The bill would change that to 13,189 signatures for 2018, and the number required in 2020 would be a lower number, which cannot be known exactly until after the 2018 election is held. The new formula for the number of signatures in a midterm year would be one-half of 1% of the total vote cast for Attorney General, an office that is up only in presidential years. For getting on in a presidential year, the petition would be one-half of 1% of the highest vote cast for the three offices of Secretary of State, Auditor, and Treasurer (whichever one had the highest total vote cast). Those three offices are only up in midterm years. If SB 328 had been in effect in 2016, 6,675 signatures would have been needed.
The vote test would become more flexible. Currently Indiana is one of only two states in which it is impossible for a group to become a qualified party during a presidential election year. The other such state is New York. The bill changes the vote test so a group could become a qualified party during a presidential election year.
The old vote test is that a group must have polled 2% for Secretary of State, an office that is only up in a midterm year. The bill says the new vote test would be one-half of 1% for whichever of these offices receives the highest number of votes cast: Secretary of State, Auditor, Treasurer, or Attorney General. Attorney General is elected in presidential years, and the other three offices are elected in midterm years. Lowering the vote test from 2% to one-half of 1% is a liberalization, of course. However, a party that wanted to pass the vote test could not know in advance of the election which of the three midterm offices would received the highest vote total, so to be safe, it would need to run nominees for Auditor, Treasurer, and Secretary of State in every midterm year. In a presidential year, it would be required to run someone for Attorney General, because that would the only office for which the vote test applies.
Indiana badly needs reform. It is the only state in which Ralph Nader never got on the ballot in any of his presidential runs that has not eased the number of signatures since Nader’s last runs. The other states in which Nader never got on the ballot are North Carolina, Oklahoma and Georgia, and those three states have reduced the number of signatures during the last few years. Also Indiana is one of only four states in which Ron Paul didn’t get on the ballot when he was the Libertarian nominee in 1988, and the other three states that kept Paul off have also reduced the number of signatures since he ran. Those other states that excluded Paul are West Virginia, Missouri, and North Carolina.
