On March 5, the California Republican Party filed a federal lawsuit against the Asian American Small Business PAC, charging that the PAC sent campaign literature on behalf of a Republican running in the March 17 State Senate special election, district 7. The complaint is that the campaign literature uses the party’s elephant logo, even though the candidate, Michaela Hertle, is not endorsed by the Republican Party. Here is the complaint in the case, which was filed in the eastern district, 2:15cv-505.

The Republican National Committee trademarked its logo in 1969, according to the Complaint.

When the Washington state top-two case, Washington State Republican Party v Washington State Grange, was heard in the Ninth Circuit after being remanded by the U.S. Supreme Court, the lower federal courts said the Lanham Act doesn’t apply to political party names and symbols. The Lanham Act is the federal law concerning trademark infringement.

Four Michigan State Representatives have introduced HB 4310. It provides that each U.S. House district would elect its own presidential elector. The bill’s authors apparently forgot that Michigan has procedures for independent presidential candidates to get on the ballot, and procedures for write-ins as well. The bill only refers to party nominees for presidential elector. Here is a link to the bill.

The four sponsors are Cindy Gamrat, Todd Courser, Thomas Hooker, and Gary Glenn. Michigan used the system of letting each district choose its own presidential elector in the 1892 election.