On April 21, a New Mexico state representative was removed from the June 3 primary ballot, because a court determined that her petition lacked the required 78 valid signatures. Sandra Jeff, a Democrat, submitted 91 signatures, but her petition was challenged, and found to include only 68 valid signatures. See this story.
On April 18, the Kentucky legislature adjourned, without having passed SB 205, which would have let U.S. Senator Rand Paul run for re-election in 2016 even if he is also running for the Republican presidential nomination. See this story.
Kentucky, like most states, holds legislative elections this year. The Senate has a Republican majority and had passed the bill; the House has a Democratic majority and refused to consider the bill. If Republicans were to win a majority in the Kentucky House this year, the bill would probably pass in the next legislative session.
The press consistently fails to mention that Henry Clay was elected to the U.S. House from Kentucky in 1824 even though he was also running for President that year. He carried Kentucky in the electoral college.
The Sixth Circuit will hear Libertarian Party of Ohio v Husted at 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, April 22. The Sixth Circuit isn’t sitting this week, so the hearing will be on the telephone, with all participants being included in a conference call. On April 18, the Libertarian Party filed a supplemental letter with the court, identifying a Sixth Circuit decision from 1998 that is relevant to the case.
The issue in the case is whether the party’s statewide candidates should be kept off the party’s primary ballot, on the grounds that the circulators didn’t fill out a blank on each petition form that asks who is paying the circulator. The supplemental authority mentioned in the party’s April 18 letter refers to National Labor Relations Board v Midland Daily News, 151 F.3d 472, which found that forcing a newspaper to disclose the identity of an anonymous advertiser, even though it only involved commercial and not political speech, would significantly chill the First Amendment rights of newspapers.
The three judges are Richard Suhrheinrich, Julia Smith Gibbons, and Deborah L. Cook. Suhrheinrich is an appointee of President George H. W. Bush; the other two judges were appointed by President George W. Bush.
The April 21 San Francisco Chronicle has this article about Green Party candidate David Curtis and his attempts to be included in the April 22 debate for California Secretary of State.
UPDATE: BradBlog has also covered the story; see here. Thanks to Rick Hasen for that link.
The Sacramento Press Club, a non-profit public benefit educational corporation, is hosting a debate for candidates for California Secretary of State at noon on April 23 (Wednesday). However, so far, the Press Club has not invited David Curtis, Green Party candidate, even though the Press Club has invited two other candidates who have less voter support than Curtis, according to the April 10 California Poll.
The Press Club has invited Dan Schnur, independent, who was at 4% in that poll, as well as Derek Cressman, Democrat, who was at 3% in the same poll. Here is the letter that Curtis’s attorney has sent to the Press Club, pointing out that federal law requires debate sponsors to use objective criteria when they decide which candidates to invite into debates. Paradoxically, Curtis is a member of the Sacramento Press Club and he will be at the event, either in the audience or possibly as a late-entry into the debate. UPDATE: here is a news story.
