On December 30, the Maryland Green Party submitted its petition to be restored as a political party in Maryland. Assuming the petition is valid, the party will be on the ballot in 2016 and 2018. Assuming the petition is valid, the Green Party is now on the ballot for president in 2016 in twenty-one states.
According to this news story, it seems likely the Illinois legislature is likely to pass a bill providing for a special election for State Comptroller in 2016. Normally that office is up in midterm years and has a four-year term. Judy Baar Topinka was re-elected State Comptroller in November 2014 but then she died before the new term started.
On December 30, Iowa held a special election for State Senate, 12th district. The results: Republican Mark Costello 74.41%; Democrat Steven Adams 22.41%; Libertarian Don W. Brantz 3.18%. Here is a link to the returns on the Secretary of State’s web page.
This is the first time in recent decades that the Iowa Libertarian Party has run a legislative candidate in southwest Iowa. In 2012, when this seat was last up, Republican Joni Ernst was the only candidate on the November ballot. The special election was needed because Ernst resigned to take her seat in Congress.
The Associated Press has this story, saying the Minnesota Secretary of State has formally notified the Independence Party that it has lost its qualified status, something it has enjoyed for twenty years. The party needed to poll 5% for one of the statewide offices. The party was very unlucky, polling only 4.9% for Secretary of State. Its other statewide results were: Governor-Lieutenant Governor 2.9%; U.S. Senator 2.4%; Auditor 4.0%; Attorney General 2.3%.
The party is free to ask the legislature to ease the 5% vote test. The median vote test in the 50 states is 2%.
The Concord Monitor has this story about the December 30 court decision in Libertarian Party of New Hampshire v Gardiner.
UPDATE: here is a longer AP story about the decision.
