According to the bottom part of this article, former Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann is considering running for Governor of Hawaii this year as an independent candidate. A poll suggests that 39% of the voters would consider voting for him if he did that. Hannemann was elected Mayor of Honolulu in a non-partisan election in 2004 and re-elected in 2008. He is of German and Samoan extraction and is six feet seven inches in height.

If he does run, he only needs 25 valid signatures, but must run in the open primary and must outpoll at least one gubernatorial candidate who won the nomination of a qualified party, or at least 10% of the total primary vote, whichever is less. If a Libertarian or a Green runs for Governor, Hannemann is virtually certain to pass the primary vote test, because relatively few voters choose a Libertarian primary ballot or a Green primary ballot. Thanks to PoliticalWire for the link.

On February 14, the Texas Bar Association released a poll of its members, for the 2014 statewide partisan judicial races. Over one-eighth of all bar members participated in the poll. See this story, which has a link to the results.

For Court of Criminal Appeals, place 3, the Libertarian, Mark W. Bennett, outpolled the Democratic candidate, John Granberg. Bennett is well-known in Texas, partly because of his blog “Defending People”. He is a Houston criminal defense lawyer, who was also a Libertarian nominee in 2012 for a statewide judicial race. In his 2012 race, in which his only opponent was a Republican, Bennett polled 22.1% of the vote. His 2012 vote total, 1,331,364, was the highest number of votes ever received by any Libertarian nominee for any office.

The full results for the 2014 poll for Criminal Appeals, place 3, are: Republican Bert Richardson 2,166; Republican Barbara Walther 2,115; Bennett 2,083; Democrat John Granberg 1,802.

Libertarians and Greens also did well in the poll in some other judicial races. For Criminal Appeals, place 4, a race with no Democrat, the Libertarian, Quanah Parker, received 23.39% and the Green, Judith Mills Sanders-Castro, got 16.06%. For Criminal Appeals, place 9, another race with no Democrat, the Libertarian, William Bryan Strange III, got 23.02% and the Green, George Joseph Altgelt, got 19.42%. In the race for Supreme Court, place 7, a race with a Democrat and a Republican, the Libertarian, Don Fulton, got 13.10% and the Green, Charles Edwin Waterbury, got 5.78%. Thanks to Jim Riley for the link.

This is old news, but B.A.N. just found out. In 2013, the Maine legislature passed LD 504, which eases one method by which parties become ballot-qualified in Maine. Ever since 1976, Maine had had an extremely difficult petition procedure for a group to tranform itself into a qualified party. It required the signatures of 5% of the last gubernatorial vote, and furthermore, all the signers had to be either registered independents, or members of the group that was trying to qualify.

The 2013 bill eliminated the petition, and instead, provided that a group can become a qualified party by persuading at least 5,000 voters to register as members of that group. The bill was signed into law on May 24, 2013. The bill was sponsored by Senator John Tuttle (D-Sanford).

The old 5% petition was so difficult, it had been used successfully only twice, by the Reform Party in 1995, and by Americans Elect in 2011. Probably the impetus for LD 504 was that it was a great deal of work for Maine election officials to check the Americans Elect petition, which required 28,639 valid signatures. The new procedure requires far less work for election officials.

The now-abolished 5% petition procedure was never the only way for a group in Maine to become a qualified party. The more common method, which still exists, is for a group to use the independent petition procedure to place a candidate for Governor or President on the November ballot. This procedure permits choice of a partisan label, other than just “independent.” If the candidate polls at least 5%, the group becomes a qualified party. That is the method used by the Maine Green Party several times, starting in 1994 when the party’s gubernatorial nominee polled over 5%. Thanks to Geoff Pallay for this news.