On June 24, the Moderate Party of New Jersey asked the New Jersey Supreme Court to hear In re Malinowski Petition for Nomination for General Election. This is the lawsuit that argues that the State Constitution protects the right of two parties to jointly nominate the same candidate. The Moderate Party had wanted to nominate an individual who was also the Democratic nominee for U.S. House. The State Appeals Court had upheld the ban on fusion.
On June 6, the Mississippi Secretary of State asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear Watson v Republican National Committee, 24-1260. The issue is whether the 1872 federal law telling states to hold congressional elections in the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November of even-numbered years means that all ballots must be received by that date. Here is the cert petition.
In October 2024 the Fifth Circuit had ruled that the 1872 federal law setting congressional election day means that all ballots must be received by election officials by that day. No other circuit ever came to that conclusion, although there haven’t been many cases. The Secretary of State’s petition to the court says if the Fifth Circuit is correct, then the laws of 29 other states are also void.
The current Mississippi law, which the Fifth Circuit invalidated, says absentee postal ballots must be postmarked by election day, but they are valid if they are received in the elections office by five business days after the election.
The U.S. Supreme Court has already accepted a related case, from Illinois. That case, Bost v Illinois State Board of Elections, 24-568, will probably be argued near the end of 2025. But in that case, the lower court had not only upheld the Illinois law that allows absentee ballots to arrive a few days after election day; it also said the plaintiffs don’t even have standing to raise the issue. The U.S. Supreme Court will only decide the standing issue, not the timing issue.
In the Mississippi case, the U.S. District Court had ruled that the Republican and Libertarian Parties do have standing, but that the Mississippi law does not conflict with the 1872 law.
On June 6, Hawaii Governor Josh Green signed HB 134. It directs the state elections office to develop a system by which candidates may file nomination petitions electronically. The bill does not try to set forth the details of how that would work. This is not quite the same as allowing signatures to be collected electronically; instead it relates to submitting the petitions after they are finished.
On June 8, the Louisiana legislature passed HB 342. It increases filing fees for statewide state office from $750 to $3,500 for U.S. Senator; $2,500 for statewide state office; and $1,500 for U.S. House.
However, the bill decreases the number of signatures in lieu of the filing fee. Statewide office drops from 5,000 signatures to 2,500 signatures. U.S. House drops from 1,000 signatures to 750, but only for the primary.
Starting in 2026, Louisiana uses partisan nominations for congress, but continues the old system of no party nominees for state and local office. Oddly, the bill does not change any filing fees or petition requirements for congressional candidates who are not running in a party primary. This may have been an oversight. It would be strange for a state to have different filing fee amounts (for the same office) in the primary, compared to the general election.
Maine Governor Janet Mills still hasn’t acted on LD 1666, which passed the legislature on June 11. It would extend ranked choice voting to general elections for state office. Currently the system is very peculiar. Maine has ranked choice voting for all federal office, in primaries and general elections both. But for state office, it has ranked choice voting for primaries but not general elections. See this story.
