According to this story, U.S. Senator Rand Paul was asked by a member of the audience if he would support the Libertarian Party nominee in 2016 if he doesn’t get the Republican nomination. Paul said that he expected to support the Republican nominee and said he had never endorsed a Libertarian Party nominee. But the questioner then reminded him that he had indeed endorsed Ron Paul, the Libertarian presidential nominee in 1988, and Paul at that point acknowledged this point.

Rand Paul was 25 in 1988. He attended the Seattle national convention of the Libertarian Party (held in September 1987) and worked on his father’s presidential campaign that year.

On April 26, a Montana state trial court removed Lawrence Van Dyke from the June 3 primary ballot, for the non-partisan election for Supreme Court Justice. As a result, only one candidate for that office, the incumbent, remains on the ballot. See this story. It is expected that Van Dyke will appeal to the State Supreme Court.

The basis for the decision is that the Montana Constitution requires candidates for judge to have been a active member of the Montana bar for the preceding five years. Van Dyke has been a member of the Montana bar continuously, but during part of the recent five-year period, he was on inactive status. Thanks to Mike Fellows for the link.

Earlier this month, Clear Path Strategies conducted a poll for the June 3 California gubernatorial primary. This was not a telephone poll. Instead, all respondents were shown a list of all fifteen candidates on the ballot, which includes their party membership and their occupation. See this San Francisco Chronicle story for the results (the results for each candidate are near the bottom of the story).

Luis Rodriguez, Green Party candidate, is at 2.6%. Cindy Sheehan, Peace & Freedom Party candidate, is at 2.3%. Robert Newman, an independent who has been endorsed by the Constitution Party, is at 3.1%.

Jerry Brown is at 45.6% and Republican Assemblyman Tim Donnelly is second with 18.3%.