One of the Ranked Choice Voting Bills in Congress Now Has a Bill Number

Posted on by December 19, 2025
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One of the congressional bills to mandate use of ranked choice voting in all congressional elections now has a bill number, HR 6589. It has 16 sponsors. The text of the bill is still not up on the congressional website.

The lead sponsor is Jaime Raskin of Maryland. It is co-sponsored by representatives from California (Scott Peters and Eric Swalwell), Florida (Summer Lee), Illinois (Delia Ramirez), Maine (Chellie Pingree), Massachusetts (Seth Moulton and Ayanna Pressley), Michigan (Shri Thanedar), Minnesota (Kelly Morrison, Ilhan Omar, and Angie Craig), New Mexico (Teresa Leger Fernandez), Tennessee (Steve Cohen), Virginia (Donald Beyer), and Washington (Pramila Jayapal).

All the sponsors are Democrats. It is somewhat disappointing that there are no co-sponsors from New York, given that New York City uses ranked choice voting for citywide office primaries.

The identical U.S. Senate bill sponsored by Peter Welch of Vermont still doesn’t have a bill number.

The bills would outlaw using top-two in congressional elections, although states could still use top-four systems.

Maine Green Party Files Paperwork with Secretary of State to Let Independent Voters Sign Primary Petitions

Posted on by December 19, 2025
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On December 19, the Maine Green Party filed paperwork with the Maine Secretary of State, letting the state know that the party wants independent voters to sign petitions for Green Party primary candidates. Because Maine has very difficult primary petition requirements, this will help the party to run candidates in its own primary. The state requires primary candidates to submit 2,000 signatures for statewide office, which is very difficult for a party that doesn’t have hundreds of thousands of members. But if independent voters can sign, the burden is lessened. 32.1% of the Maine voters are registered independents.

Ever since the Green Party has been a qualified party in Maine, the primary petition hurdle has kept it from running anyone for either house of Congress. Hopefully that will now change. The procedure by which independents can sign primary petitions (for those parties that desire that) was only created this year.

Maine has ranked choice voting in general elections for congress.

Democratic Party Will Keep Autopsy on 2024 Election Secret

Posted on by December 18, 2025
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In July of this year, the Democratic Party announced that it had chosen Paul Rivera, a New York political consultant, to prepare a report on why the party lost the 2024 presidential election. On December 18, the Democratic National Chairman, Ken Martin, said that the report has been completed, but it would not be released publicly.

It had been hoped that the Rivera report would say the Democratic Party made a mistake when it attacked the ballot access of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. The relentless attacks caused Kennedy to drop out of the race and endorse Donald Trump. But whether that point got into the report or not is a mystery.

None of Maine’s Four Qualified Parties Has Yet Filed Notice of Wanting to Let Independent Voters Sign Primary Petitions

Posted on by December 18, 2025
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Earlier this year, the Maine legislature passed a bill that says if a party wants to let independent voters sign petitions to get candidates on that party’s primary ballot, the party must notify the state by December 31. As of December 18, none of Maine’s four qualified parties have filed the form.

It is especially important that the Green and Libertarian Parties file this paperwork. The number of signatures to get a candidate on a primary ballot is severe. The requirement is the same number of signatures for each party, regardless of how many registered voters that party has. For example, for statewide office, 2,000 signatures are required, which is impossibly difficult for a party like the Libertarian Party, which has fewer than 7,000 registered voters.

The primary petitions are so difficult for the Green Party that no Green has ever been able to get on a Green primary ballot for either house of Congress, and that is true for the Libertarian Party as well.

Arizona and National Republican Parties File Lawsuit to Stop No Labels from Changing its Name to Arizona Independent Party

Posted on by December 23, 2025
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On December 11, the Arizona Republican Party and the Republican National Committee filed a lawsuit in Arizona state court against the Secretary of State. The lawsuit argues that the Secretary of State did not have the authority to let No Labels change its name. See this story. The case is Republican National Committee v Fontes, Superior Court, Maricopa County, cv2025-065841.

Thanks to Teri Ann Hourihan for the link.