On March 10, Pennsylvania Representative Keith Greiner (R-Lancaster) introduced HB 1318. It moves the primary in presidential years, for all office, from April to mid-March. Here is the text of the bill. If enacted, the bill would have no impact on petition deadlines for independent candidates and the nominees of unqualified parties. Thanks to Josh Putnam of FrontloadingHQ for this news.
This wikipedia article has the preliminary popular vote for the June 7 congressional election in Mexico. The official results will be released soon, and then it will be possible to know how many seats each party won.
On June 8, Ohio Governor John Kasich signed HB 153, which moves the primary for all office (in presidential years) from the first Tuesday after the first Monday in March, to the second Tuesday after the first Monday in March.
As a result, the 2016 primary moves from March 8 to March 15. That also moves the petition deadline for non-presidential independents from March 7 to March 14. Thanks to Josh Putnam for this news.
Also on June 8, Kansas Governor Sam Brownback signed HB 2104, the omnibus election law bill that eliminates the Kansas presidential primary. Kansas hasn’t actually held a presidential primary since 1992, because the budget never had enough money for it in subsequent years and the legislature would always pass a bill suspending it for the upcoming election. So, realistically, this isn’t a meaningful change. Other states that won’t hold a presidential primary for any party in 2016 are Alaska, Colorado, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Minnesota, Nevada, North Dakota, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming. There is still a tiny chance that the special session of the Washington state legislature could restore a presidential primary.
Richard M. Rubino, author of several books about U.S. politics, writes here that if there were an independent presidential candidate who could appeal to voters who like Bernie Sanders and also to voters who like Rand Paul, such a candidate would be formidable.
On June 8 the Maine Senate tentatively passed LD 742, and on June 9 the Maine House also passed it. It asks the voters if they wish to amend the State Constitution, to require that initiative petitions obtain the signatures of voters in each of the two U.S. House districts. Maine initiatives need the signatures of 10% of the last gubernatorial vote. The bill would ask the voters to change this to 10% in each of the two districts.
As originally introduced, the bill would have required signatures from each county, but that was scrapped because it violates the U.S. Supreme Court precedent Moore v Ogilvie. Statewide petitions cannot have distribution requirements based on counties, because counties are unequal in population. Thanks to Thomas MacMillan for this news.
