On December 16, filing for the Ohio 2016 primary closed. Here is a list of the candidates who filed for statewide office. Ohio has three ballot-qualified parties: Republican, Democratic, and Green.
No one filed in the Green Party presidential primary, but the party does have a candidate for U.S. Senate, which is the only other statewide office up in 2016.
For the presidential primary, 12 Republicans filed and 5 Democrats filed.
FrontloadingHQ has been running a series of blog posts, explaining the Republican delegate apportionment rules for each state. So far thirteen states have been covered. The blog’s author, Josh Putnam, has been posting a new state approximately every day. He covers the states in the order of their caucuses and primaries.
For example, here is his Vermont post, which was posted on December 17. He posted Iowa on October 6; New Hampshire on October 12; South Carolina on October 14; Alabama on November 9; Alaska on November 12; Arkansas on November 14; Colorado on December 9; Georgia on December 10; Minnesota on December 12; Oklahoma on December 13; Tennessee on December 15; and Texas on December 16.
According to this story, the December 15, 2015 Republican presidential debate had the third highest viewership of any televised presidential primary debate in U.S. history. This is more evidence that having as many as nine candidates does not limit the usefulness or success of a debate.
In the entire history of the U.S., there have never been a general election with more than seven presidential candidates who had enough presidential elector candidates to theoretically win the election. The position of the Commission on Presidential Debates, that its debates should be limited to two candidates, is no longer tenable. Thanks to PoliticalWire for the link.
The News & Observer, North Carolina’s second-largest newspaper, published in Raleigh, has this story about the Libertarian Party candidates who filed for statewide office on December 15. The Libertarian Party nominates by primary. The deadline for candidates to file for primaries is December 21, so more may yet file.
According to this Fresno Bee story, some California county election officials have been thinking about charging political parties for the cost of administering elections for party office. But they have given up on the idea. The story says if the counties did charge the parties, the costs for electing county central committee members in Fresno County alone would be between $200,000 and $300,000 each.
About half the states have government-administered elections to enable parties to choose party officers, and the other half of the states don’t. In those states, party officers are all chosen in party meetings. California permits parties to opt out of public elections for party office, and the Libertarian Party has opted out. Thanks to John Tuteur for the link.
