On January 14, a lawsuit was filed against some Pennsylvania ballot access restrictions that pertain to primary election petitions. The lawsuit challenges the ban on out-of-state circulators for primary petitions. It also challenges the requirement that each sheet of a primary petition be notarized. And it challenges the law that says voters may sign only one petition for the same office.

The plaintiffs are Benezet Consulting LLC and Trenton Pool, who intend to collect signatures to get Rand Paul and perhaps other presidential candidates on the Pennsylvania presidential primary ballot. Pennsylvania primary petitions for statewide office need 2,000 signatures. They can only be circulated in a three-week period. This year, the period is January 26 to February 16. The Pennsylvania primary is April 26, 2016. The case is Benezet Consulting v Cortes, middle district, 1:16cv-74. It was assigned to Judge John E. Jones, Bush Jr. appointee.

The same three restrictions as applied to general election petitions were struck down in Pennsylvania on March 2, 2015, and the state did not appeal. That case was Green Party of Pennsylvania v Aichele, 89 F.Supp.3d 723 (eastern district). The only difference in the issues in the two cases are that one case pertains to primary petitions and the other to general election petitions; also the primary petition case challenges the law (not applicable to general elections) that the circulator must be registered in the same party as the candidate whose petition is being circulated.

Nebraska State Senator John Murante (R-Gretna) has introduced LB 871, to move the presidential primary from May to early March. The bill would leave the primary for other office in May. The bill would not take effect until after 2016. Thanks to Josh Putnam for this news.

On January 12, the Ohio Libertarian Party asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene in its ballot access case, which was filed in September 2013. The case is still in the U.S. District Court, although the U.S. District Court has ruled on most of the case. The part of the case that is still not decided in the U.S. District Court is whether the 2014 removal of the party’s candidate for Governor from the primary ballot was a case of discriminatory enforcement.

The party had asked the Sixth Circuit to reverse another finding of the U.S. District Court, on whether the 2013 Ohio ballot access law violates the Ohio Constitution. But when the Sixth Circuit ruled on that, on December 9, it dismissed that appeal on procedural grounds. The Sixth Circuit opinion of December 9 was written by Judge Alice Batchelder, who is married to William Batchelder. Mr. Batchelder was speaker of the Ohio House when the challenged law was passed in 2013, and he was a co-sponsor of the legislation. After the Sixth Circuit released its order, which revealed for the first time that Judge Batchelder was on the panel for that case, the party asked for reconsideration, largely on the grounds that Judge Batchelder should have recused herself because she is the wife of the legislator. But Judge Batchelder then declined to recuse herself.

Now the party has asked the U.S. Supreme Court for a stay, which would restore its appeal in the Sixth Circuit. Here is the party’s filing to the U.S. Supreme Court, which is 22 pages long, plus an Exhibit consisting of the Sixth Circuit’s orders. 15A-725.