On December 31, 2014, a new on-line petition directed toward the Commission on Presidential Debates was launched. The petition asks the Commission to invite all presidential candidates who are theoretically capable of winning the election. In all U.S. history, no presidential election has ever had more than seven such candidates. The 2012 election only had four such candidates. Here is the link to the group. Thanks to June Genis for the link.
On January 2, 2015, the Republican Party of ten Montana counties filed an amended complaint in Ravalli County Republican Central Committee v McCulloch, 6:14cv-58. This is the lawsuit which challenges Montana’s open primary as applied to the Republican Party. The amended complaint adds a challenge to the part of the law that requires election of party officers in an open primary.
Although the state Republican Party is still not a plaintiff, the Republican Party state convention in June 2014 passed a resolution, almost unanimously, that “it is the position of the Montana Republican Party that the voters that select candidates to appear on the general election ballot should be limited to members of the Republican Party who have registered themselves as members of the party if a primary election process is used.”
The ten county Republican Parties which are in the lawsuit already are those of Ravalli, Gallatin, Sanders, Dawson, Stillwater, Richland, Carbon, Flathead, Madison, and Big Horn Counties.
On December 24, U.S. District Court Judge David O. Carter upheld California’s ban on write-in votes at the general election for Congress and partisan state office. Milonopoulos v Bowen, central district, 2:14cv-5973. The case had been filed by Theo Milonopoulos on July 30, 2014. He was a write-in candidate for U.S. House, 33rd District, in the June 2014 primary, and he only received one write-in vote. But he wanted to be a write-in candidate in November, so he filed a pro se lawsuit.
The decision was issued only two days after the hearing. Judge Carter said that because the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Hawaii’s ban on write-in votes in 1992 in Burdick v Takushi, therefore the California write-in ban is constitutional. Carter wrote that Hawaii’s general election choices are more restricted than California’s. This is untrue. In California, all congressional and partisan state office races are limited by law to only two candidates. Hawaii general election ballots give voters far more choices. In November 2014, there were nominees of four parties on the Hawaii ballot for Governor, three for U.S. Senate, three for U.S. House in the 2nd district, and up to four candidates in legislative races.
Carter also said that if California permitted write-in candidacies in November, someone who ran in the primary and lost might file as a write-in. This does not follow logically. California is free to permit write-in candidates in November but to refuse to count write-ins for candidates who had run in the primary, and several states follow that policy.
Nielsen Merksamer, the law firm that intervenes in all California election law lawsuits that have any bearing on the top-two primary, has forwarded a copy of the Milonopoulos decision to the California State Court of Appeals that is hearing Rubin v Bowen, the minor party challenge to the California top-two system. Rubin v Bowen will be heard in San Francisco on Thursday morning, January 15. Nielsen Merksamer has informed the three judges that are hearing Rubin v Bowen that they should take the Milonopoulos decision into account when they hear Rubin v Bowen. Nielsen Merksamer represents Californians for an Open Primary, which holds itself out to the public as a group that promotes voting rights. Neilsen Merksamer had intervened in the Milonopoulos lawsuit in support of the ban on write-in votes.
The New York Working Families Party polled its best percentages ever for federal and state office in November 2014, other than the gubernatorial race. The party polled its highest vote percentages ever for the other statewide offices, Comptroller and Attorney General.
For U.S. House races, its nominees polled 6.12% of the vote in the districts in which the party had nominees. It had nominees in 24 of the 27 districts. All of them were also Democratic Party nominees. Previous Working Families percentages in New York U.S. House races (in which the party had nominees) were: 2000 1.79%; 2002 3.04%; 2004 3.03%; 2006 4.22%; 2008 3.48%; 2010 4.43%; 2012 3.65%.
For State Senate races, WFP nominees polled 5.96% in the districts in which it had nominees. Previous equivalent percentages were: 2000 1.86%; 2002 3.45%; 2004 3.21%; 2006 4.79%; 2008 3.35%; 2010 4.61%; 2012 3.63%.
For Assembly, WFP nominees received 7.24%. Previous showings were: 2000 2.05%; 2002 2.84%; 2004 3.20%; 2006 4.39%; 2008 3.62%; 2010 5.05%; 2012 4.62%.
For the first time in a regularly-scheduled legislative race, the WFP topped 25%. It did that in the 44th Assembly district for its nominee, James Brennan, who was also the Democratic nominee. There was a Republican in this race also. Brennan received 25.12% on the WFP line. The party’s second-best showing in a 2014 legislative race was in the 52nd Assembly district race, where its nominee, Peter Sikora, was not the Democratic Party nominee, but just the WFP nominee. The Republicans also had a nominee in that race. Both the 44th and 52nd Assembly districts are in Brooklyn.
Although the 2014 showing for Governor was lower than the WFP showings of 2006 and 2010, it didn’t decline much. All three years, and always in the party’s history, the WFP gubernatorial nominee has been the person who was also the Democratic nominee. The WFP showings for Governor have been: 1998 1.08%; 2002 1.98%; 2006 3.50% (its best); 2010 3.33%; 2014 3.31%.
Evan Falchuk, founder of the United Independent Party, has this op-ed in the Springfield Republican daily newspaper. Falchuk mentions that most Massachusetts general elections for state legislature had only one person on the ballot, although, unfortunately, he doesn’t explain why. Massachusetts has the nation’s most restrictive laws for candidates getting on a primary ballot, especially for Congress and statewide office.
