The Constitution Party’s presidential convention will be April 13-16, 2016, in Salt Lake City, Utah.
The Green Party still hasn’t decided on its location or its dates, but it usually nominates in June or July of the presidential election year.
The Libertarian Party national convention will be May 26-30 in Orlando, Florida. The two major party conventions will be in July.
According to this Newsday story, two lawsuits have been filed to challenge the legal existence of the Women’s Equality Party of New York. Thanks to Michael Drucker for the link.
The plaintiffs are ordinary voters, and they are following the standard methods for challenging petitions. Yet, the formation of the Women’s Equality Party doesn’t depend on any particular petition; instead it relates to the approval of the party’s statewide candidates for the party’s rules. The two identical cases are in Niagara County and Nassau County. The Niagara County case is Tamburlin v State Board of Elections, 15-6326. The Nassau County case is Giovanelli v State Board of Elections, 15-6294.
The Arkansas Green Party recently submitted 1,600 signatures to be on the Arkansas ballot for President in 2016. The law requires 1,000 for that purpose.
The United Independent Party is a ballot-qualified party in Massachusetts. However, Massachusetts requires every qualified party to do one of two things to remain ballot-qualified: (1) poll 3% for any statewide race; (2) have registration equal to 1% of the state total.
The United Independent Party, formed in 2014, does not expect to have a presidential nominee in 2016. It is only interested in Massachusetts state government issues. And in 2016, there are no other statewide races on the ballot in Massachusetts. Therefore, the party will lose its status unless it can get its registration up to approximately 40,000 members by November 2016.
The party has been working on getting more registrants, and at the end of June 2014, it had 6,100. If the party achieves its registration goal, it will be the first party, other than the Democratic and Republican Parties, to have met that goal. The 1% registration alternative has only existed in the law since 1990.
On July 17, History professor Allen Lichtman testified in the ongoing North Carolina trial over changes to laws that affect voting. He testified that the legislators who voted for the bill intended to reduce the participation of Black voters. See this story.
Lichtman has testified in election lawsuits in the past. In 1991 he testified in favor of the New Alliance Party, in its lawsuit against the April petition deadline for new parties in Alabama. In 2004, he testified against Ralph Nader and the Reform Party in the lawsuit over whether Nader should be on the Florida ballot.
