Rob Sarvis, the Virginia Libertarian nominee for U.S. Senate in 2014, will file his cert petition with the U.S. Supreme Court on or before December 17. The issue in the case is the Virginia law that says the parties that polled 10% in one of the two previous elections are always automatically listed at the top of the ballot. The lower federal courts had upheld the law, writing that even though they agree that being listed at the top of the ballot is advantageous, that the state has an interest in bolstering the two largest political parties against all those competing with them.

Virginia law itself acknowledges the fairness of ballot rotation, because the law says there should be a random process in every election to determine whether the Republican nominees or the Democratic nominees are listed first or second.

The Sarvis cert petition would have been due this month, but Sarvis received an extension. The Coalition for Free & Open Elections (COFOE) is helping pay for the printing of the cert petition. COFOE thanks all the people who have contributed to COFOE this year. COFOE gets all its revenue from readers of Ballot Access News.

This story about the Nebraska Libertarian Party says State Senator Laura Ebke, who joined the Libertarian Party in May 2016, is helping teach party leaders how to make the party more effective. The story also says the Libertarian Party is expected to have 10,000 registered voters by the time of next month’s election. Back in February 2016 it had 6,984 registrants.

This story says that Matt Borges, chair of the Ohio Republican Party, is telling the press that he doesn’t know who he will vote for in the presidential election. Although there are many Republican Party office-holders who have said they will not vote for Donald Trump, Borges appears to be the only state chair of a Republican Party who has said this.

Borges played a leading role in the 2014 election, finding a challenger to the Libertarian Party primary gubernatorial petition. That challenge worked and was responsible for keeping the Libertarian Party from nominating anyone for Governor in 2014. Because the Ohio Libertarian Party needed to poll at least 2% for Governor in order to remain on the Ohio ballot, without a nominee, it went off the ballot, and it has not got back on since.