On January 13, 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear Puerto Rico v Valle, 15-108. Although this is a criminal law case, it requires the Court to determine if Puerto Rico is sovereign or is simply a dependency of the United States. Lyle Denniston has this interesting article about the case. Thanks to HowAppealing for the link.
The Ohio Secretary of State has rejected Martin O’Malley’s petition to be placed on the Democratic presidential primary ballot. See this story. He needed 1,000 signatures and submitted 1,175. He has been told that only 772 signatures are valid.
Ohio voter registration forms do not ask about party affiliation. However, signatures on Ohio primary petitions are not valid if the signer voted in some other party’s primary in the last election. Signatures on O’Malley’s petition would have been invalidated if the signer voted in the Republican, Green, or Libertarian primary in 2014. Also, of course, signatures would be invalid if the signer isn’t registered to vote at all. Thanks to Austin Cassidy for this news.
Newsweek has this sympathetic article about John McAfee and his campaign for the Libertarian Party presidential nomination.
The Sioux City Journal has this article about the Centrist Project. In 2014 it backed a few strong independent candidates for U.S. Senate, including Larry Pressler in South Dakota. It plans to do that again in 2016. The article quotes Greg Orman, a strong independent for U.S. Senate in Kansas in 2014, that independents are in a better position to win when they have opponents from both major parties.
The Donald Trump campaign is threatening to sue the Virginia Republican Party over the party’s recent decision to change procedures at the polls at the March 1 presidential primary. Virginia does not have registration by party. But the state party recently voted to place the sentence, “My signature below indicates that I am a Republican” on its sign-in tally books. See this story.
The Republican Party of Virginia did not require this in 2012 or 2008, and in 2004 there was no Republican presidential primary in Virginia. The state party put this policy in place in September 2015, and party officials are criticizing the Trump campaign for waiting until now to object. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.
