Nebraska and Maine are the only two states in which each U.S. House district elects its own presidential elector. On April 4, a Nebraska bill to switch the state to the system used in the other 48 states won a procedural victory. The Senate voted 32-15 to cut off any filibuster against the bill. That vote required a two-thirds majority, which was met. It will now be easy to pass the bill, and it probably will pass soon. Nebraska has a unicameral legislature. The bill is LB 10, introduced January 8, 2015 by State Senator Beau McCoy (R-Omaha). Thanks to Tony Roza for this news.

On April 4, Oregon Governor Kate Brown signed SB 1501 and SB 1599. They make it somewhat easier for parties to remain ballot-qualified. Earlier this year the legislature had passed a bill to automatically register every adult citizen known to exist, unless the individual declines. The effect of that bill is to vastly increase the number of registered voters who have not yet chosen to be a registered member of a party. Because parties stay on the ballot if they have a certain share of the voters registered as members, that registration change made it more difficult for parties to qualify. So the new laws change the method of calculating percentages, to exclude those new automatic voters. But the change is only temporary and expires after the 2018 election.

New York’s presidential primary is April 19. According to this story, the State Board is getting approximately 100 phone complaints per day from voters who are too late to register into either the Democratic Party or the Republican Party, so as to be able to vote in those parties’ presidential primaries. New York easily has the nation’s most restrictive time limits on when voters can join a party if they wish to vote in an upcoming primary.