On January 20, U.S. District Court Judge William Haynes set a trial date in two pending Tennessee ballot access cases. The trial date is Tuesday, February 23, 9 a.m., in Nashville. The trial combines the 2011 case that challenges the number of signatures needed for a newly-qualifying party, and the 2014 case on how a party remains on the ballot. The only undecided issue from the 2014 case is whether the ruling (which put the Constitution and Green Parties on the 2014 ballot) should also apply to put those two parties on the 2016 ballot.

The 2011 case over the number of signatures has been won twice in U.S. District Court, but each time the Sixth Circuit then said the case needs more evidence.

Rob Richie has this interesting article in Huffington Post, showing with actual data from 1992 how an independent presidential candidate could win, despite the U.S. Constitution’s provision that when no one wins a majority in the electoral college, the U.S. House chooses the president with each state getting one vote.

Richie’s post can be seen as rebutting an article by Norm Ornstein which says that an independent could never win because of those provisions of the U.S. Constitution. A link to Ornstein’s piece is in the Richie piece.

This news story lists the thirteen Republicans and six Democrats who are circulating petitions to get on the major party presidential primaries in Rhode Island. Scroll down to the bottom. Apparently no one is seeking to run in the presidential primary of the Moderate Party, which is also ballot-qualified and which could have a presidential primary if at least two candidates qualified to run. Thanks to the commentators who pointed out that the original post was incomplete.

One Republican has taken out papers but is not mentioned in the story. He is Paul Boring.