Texas held a special election for State House, district 17, on January 6. Five candidates ran. Texas special elections don’t have party nominees; all candidates file and run in the same election, and if no one gets 50%, there is a runoff.

The vote was: Republican John Cyrier 3,515; Republican Brent Goleman 1,866; independent Linda Curtis 1,046; Democrat Ty McDonald 907; Democrat Shelley Cartier 290. Because no one got 50%, there will be a runoff between Cyrier and Goleman.

Curtis, the independent candidate, placed third, ahead of both Democrats. This is probably the first time in decades that an independent outpolled major party members in any Texas race for federal or state office. Texas hasn’t elected an independent to the legislature since 1936. Here is a link to the Secretary of State’s web page, giving election returns for that race.

In November 2014, the vote for this district was: Republican Tim Kleinschmidt 64.6%; Democrat Carolyn Banks 35.4%.

Virginia Delegate Sam Rasoul (D-Roanoke) has introduced HB 1463. It eases the vote test for a group to obtain and retain political party status. The bill lowers the vote test from 10% to 4% at either of the last two statewide elections.

If the bill were to pass, the Libertarian Party would be ballot-qualified for 2016, because it got 6.52% for Governor in November 2013. In November 2014, for U.S. Senate, it did not get 4%; it got 2.43%.

Rasoul is in his first term.

The reason the existing Virginia vote test applies to the next two statewide elections, instead of just the next election, is that in 1990, the Democratic Party didn’t run anyone for U.S. Senate, which was the only statewide office up that year. After the election, the legislature quickly changed the vote test so that the Democratic Party would remain on the ballot. The 1990 precedent shows that when the legislature eases the vote test, it applies retrospectively. “Retrospective” means that when a bill takes effect, election administrators can look to past election returns to apply the new law.

The Virginia vote test is tied for being second-highest in the nation. The other 10% vote test states are Oklahoma and New Jersey. Alabama, at 20%, has the highest vote test. Thanks to Bill Redpath for this news.

On January 2, 2015, the Republican Party of ten Montana counties filed an amended complaint in Ravalli County Republican Central Committee v McCulloch, 6:14cv-58. This is the lawsuit which challenges Montana’s open primary as applied to the Republican Party. The amended complaint adds a challenge to the part of the law that requires election of party officers in an open primary.

Although the state Republican Party is still not a plaintiff, the Republican Party state convention in June 2014 passed a resolution, almost unanimously, that “it is the position of the Montana Republican Party that the voters that select candidates to appear on the general election ballot should be limited to members of the Republican Party who have registered themselves as members of the party if a primary election process is used.”

The ten county Republican Parties which are in the lawsuit already are those of Ravalli, Gallatin, Sanders, Dawson, Stillwater, Richland, Carbon, Flathead, Madison, and Big Horn Counties.