The Courthouse News Service has this story about the lawsuit filed on October 8 against the California law that permits some candidates, but not all candidates, to list their party registration on the ballot if they are running for Congress or partisan state office.
A New Jersey state trial court will hold oral arguments in October 14 in the Republican Party’s lawsuit, arguing that the party should be allowed to substitute a new nominee for Assembly, 38th district. The election is November 3, 2015. See this story. In the meantime the court told election officials not to print any more ballots.
Earlier this year the Kentucky Republican Party decided to choose delegates to the national convention by caucus, in March, instead of using the May presidential primary. State law gives a party until December 31, 2015, to tell the state that it doesn’t want a presidential primary.
The Kentucky Republican Party still hasn’t filed this notice with state elections officials. It is conceivable that the party wants to wait until the last minute to make the decision final, just in case Senator Rand Paul pulls out of the Republican presidential race. This Politico story says that some Republicans in Kentucky wish he would do that.
On October 2, the Ohio Supreme Court issued two opinions, both of them finding that when a candidate’s ballot access petition is rejected because the county board of elections determined there aren’t enough valid signatures, the candidate must be permitted to present affidavits from voters that they did sign the petition.
In State ex rel Crowl v Delaware County Board of Elections, 2015-Ohio-4097, candidate Douglas Crowl was running for Porter Township trustee, a nonpartisan election. He needed 25 signatures and submitted 28. The Board compared signatures on the petition with signatures on the voter registration forms, and determined that eight signatures didn’t look similar enough. The candidate then obtained affidavits from all eight voters whose signatures had been rejected, saying they did sign the petition. But the County Board said they could not consider such evidence. The State Supreme Court ruled 4-1 that the Board of Elections was wrong to have ignored the affidavits, and the Court ordered the candidate onto the ballot.
In State ex rel Burroughs v Summit County Board of Elections, 2015-Ohio-4122, candidate Richard Burroughs was an independent candidate for Akron city council. He needed 23 signatures and submitted 24. The county board felt that four of the signatures didn’t match. Burroughs filed a lawsuit and presented affidavits from all four voters whose signatures had been rejected, saying they had signed the petition. The Supreme Court put him on the ballot also. The vote was 4-1.
The dissenting judge said in both cases that state law has no provision for candidates to submit evidence, and called on the legislature to fix this flaw in the Ohio election law.
Larry Lessig’s web page says here that he has qualified for primary season matching funds. That will help him get on Democratic presidential primary ballots in Delaware, Montana, and Ohio. Most mainstream presidential candidates no longer filing for primary season matching funds, because recipients are then subject to spending limits that apply state-by-state.
The Federal Election Commission is not permitted to award primary season matching funds until January 1 of the election year.
