Virgin Islands election officials are still in a quandry about the upcoming election, given the order of the Virgin Islands Supreme Court of October 24, that ordered that Senator Alicia Hansen’s name be expunged from all ballots, even though early voting had already started three days earlier. See this story.
On October 15, this blog reported that two billionaires, John Arnold of Texas and Michael Bloomberg of New York, had contributed, together, $2,750,000 toward the campaign to pass Measure 90 in Oregon. Measure 90 would impose a top-two primary in Oregon.
On October 17, Arnold donated another $250,000 to the “yes” campaign, and Bloomberg donated another $400,000, so the total for the two individuals is now $3,400,000. Much of the money was transferred to Canal Partners Media, which is headquartered in Washington, D.C., and Marietta, Georgia. An additional $50,000 was given to IndependentVoting, also known as CUIP (Commmittee for a Unified Independent Party), formerly known as the New Alliance Party.
On October 27, the South Carolina Election Commission said that Republican Bobby Harrell will remain on the November ballot for State Representative, district 114. However, the Commission says it doesn’t matter how many votes he gets, his votes don’t count. There could hardly be any clearer example of the decline in the sovereignty of the voter in the United States today. It is one thing for a candidate who is elected to decline to accept the post, but quite another to tell the voters that if they vote for a particular candidate, their votes won’t be honored. See this story.
It seems somewhat likely that because this is a Republican district, Republicans will quickly come up with a write-in recommendation. Harrell recently resigned from the legislature. The ballot will list him, his Democratic opponent, and his Green Party opponent. The 114th district is in Charleston.
Russian leader Vladimir Putin, speaking in his own country, recently criticized the U.S. electoral college. See this Washington Post story. The story quotes him as saying that twice, the person who got the most popular votes failed to take the office. Actually, that has happened four times, in 1824, 1876, 1888, and 2000. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.
On October 27, a state court in Massachusetts refused to require the sponsors of that evening’s gubernatorial debate to include Evan Falchuk, nominee of the United Independent Party. See this story. UPDATE: this story has much more detail about why the judge ruled as she did.
