Political Scientist Boris Shor Says California is Now Only Second-Most Polarized State Legislature in Nation

Posted on by June 17, 2017
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Political scientist Boris Shor, who regularly tallies hundreds of thousands of roll-call votes in state legislatures, and who keeps track of polarization in state legislatures, now says California has been overtaken by Colorado as the most polarized legislature. Here are the new rankings.

The rankings bolster other political science research, which has found no correlation between type of primary system and degree of polarization. Among the seven most polarized states are one closed primary state (Colorado); one semi-closed primary state (Arizona); three open primary states (Missouri, Montana, and Texas); and the two top-two states, California and Washington. Although Colorado has recently switched to a semi-closed primary state, all its legislators were chosen in a closed primary system.

Maine House Passes Bill to Add Distribution Requirement for Statewide Initiatives

Posted on by June 16, 2017
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On June 16, the Maine House passed LD 31 by 107-36. It amends the State Constitution to add a U.S. House distribution requirement for statewide initiative petitions. Currently initiatives need a petition of 10% of the last gubernatorial vote, but they can be collected anywhere. The bill says they need 10% from each of the two U.S. House districts.

If the Senate also passes it, then the voters would vote on it.

Did Ballot Access Laws that Barred Evan McMullin from the Ballot in Some States Alter the Winner of the 2016 Presidential Election?

Posted on by February 21, 2019
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Independent presidential candidate Evan McMullin launched his candidacy on August 8, 2016. He got on the ballot in eleven states. In those eleven states, he received 510,002 votes, and the total presidential vote in those eleven states was 21,004,501. Therefore, in the states where he was on the ballot, he received 2.43% of the total valid votes cast.

He was not on the ballot in Michigan, Pennsylvania, or Wisconsin. If those states had voted for Hillary Clinton instead of Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton would have received a majority of the electoral college votes.

If McMullin had been on the ballot in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, and if his support in those states had matched his support in the states in which he was on the ballot, then he would have received, respectively: Michigan 116,623; Pennsylvania 148,916; Wisconsin 71,767. Those totals are far larger than the margin by which Trump defeated Clinton in all three states. The margins between Trump and Clinton were: Michigan 10,704; Pennsylvania 44,292; Wisconsin 22,748.

McMullin’s campaign focused on persuading Republicans to vote for McMullin instead of Trump. It is reasonable to assume that where McMullin was on the ballot, a large majority of the people who voted for him were voters who would otherwise have voted Republican for President. Therefore, it is reasonable to believe that if restrictive ballot access laws had not kept McMullin off the ballot in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, Hillary Clinton would now be President.

An actual example exists for Minnesota. Clinton carried Minnesota by 44,765 votes. McMullin was on in Minnesota and got 53,076 votes there.

McMullin had the capacity to complete petitions in states in which 5,000 signatures were required. He successfully got that many valid signatures in Kentucky and Virginia, both of which require 5,000. Pennsylvania only required 5,000 signatures, and Wisconsin only required 2,000, but McMullin couldn’t qualify in those two states because the deadlines were too early. Pennsylvania’s was August 1 and Wisconsin’s was August 2.

States could have had late August or early September petition deadlines, without harming election administration. In 2016, these six states had September deadlines: Arizona, Florida, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Dakota, and Rhode Island (the Florida deadline was the minor party deadline, not the independent deadline). These states had deadlines in the last week of August: Idaho, Oregon, Virginia, and Wyoming.

California Legislature Passes Bill Making Recall Petitions More Difficult

Posted on by April 9, 2020
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On June 15, the California Assembly passed SB 96 by 52-27. It makes it more difficult for recall petitions to succeed, by letting signers remove their names after the petition drive is over. Later the same day the Senate concurred in the Assembly amendments, by a vote of 26-11, so the bill now goes to Governor Jerry Brown.

There is currently a recall petition circulating in California against one particular Democratic State Senator. The bill takes effect immediately. However, there are court precedents that say it violates due process to make it more difficult for a petition to succeed, if the bill takes effect in the middle of a particular petition drive. One of those precedents, Hudler v Austin, was summarily affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court. 419 F Supp 1002, 1013-14 (e.d. Michigan 1976); 430 U.S. 924 (1977). In that case, the Michigan legislature had made it more difficult for newly-qualifying parties to get on the ballot, and that bill had been passed in April 1976. A federal court upheld the new requirements but said due process demanded that the new law not be applied for the 1976 election.