The Guardian has this column which implies that the leading opponents of intrusive government in the United States are the libertarian wing of the Republican Party, plus the Libertarian Party. The Guardian is the newspaper that, in the entire world, was the first to report on Edward Snowden.
Virginia holds elections this November for state office, including Governor. The petition deadline for independent candidates, and the nominees of unqualified parties, is June 11. On the deadline, Rob Sarvis, Libertarian nominee, submitted almost 18,000 signatures to meet a requirement of 10,000 valid signatures.
The only other announced candidate who is running outside the two major parties, independent Tareq Salahi, failed to submit a petition. See this Washington Post article about his failure to submit a petition. Thanks to Peter Gemma for the link.
Assuming Sarvis gets on the ballot, he will be only the fourth minor party nominee to get on the Virginia ballot in the last 40 years. The others were Libertarian Bill Redpath in 2001, Reform Party nominee Sue Harris DeBauche in 1997, and U.S. Labor Party nominee Alan Ogden in 1977. DeBauche did not need to petition, because the Reform Party was ballot-qualified in 1997, because it had polled over 10% for U.S. Senate in 1994.
On June 11, both bills for the National Popular Vote Plan bill moved ahead in the Rhode Island legislature. The House bill, HB 5575, passed the House Judiciary Committee; and the Senate bill, SB 346, passed the Senate Judiciary Committee.
On June 11, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo presented several election law proposals to the legislature. Here is a copy of his Draft Proposal #5, which would lower the number of signatures for statewide office (both for primary ballot access and general election access) from 15,000 signatures to 10,000. The proposal also would lower the number of primary candidates for State Senate from 1,000 signatures to 500; for Assembly primary candidates from 500 to 250 signatures; for independent State Senate candidates from 3,000 to 1,650; and for independent Assembly candidates from 1,500 to 750 signatures. The lower independent petition requirements would be equally applicable to the nominees of unqualified parties.
Another part of the same draft requires larger print size for names of candidates on ballots.
The Governor has a draft of another election law bill which would make it possible for voters to switch party affiliation up until three months before a primary. Current law on voters switching parties is easily the most restrictive in the nation. Voters must join a party in one calendar year in order to vote in the following year’s primary for that party. UPDATE: see this article about the Governor’s election law bills. He is no longer trying to repeal the Wilson-Pakula law, which won’t let candidates run in a party primary unless the candidate is a member of that party, or that candidate gets permission from party leaders.
According to this story, it is likely that the Maine legislature will preserve public funding for legislative candidates (with a 20% boost), yet eliminate it for gubernatorial elections. Thanks to Thomas MacMillan for the link.
