According to this Washington Post story, proponents of Oregon’s Measure 90, the top-two primary system, have already raised over $1,000,000 to advertise for their measure. The money is fundamentally from wealthy business interests.
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On August 13, at the end of oral argument, U.S. District Court Judge John Tharp said he will issue a ruling on injunctive relief in Summers v Smart on Thursday, August 21, at 9:30 a.m. This is the Illinois Green Party ballot access lawsuit.
Meanwhile, the challenge process to the Illinois Libertarian statewide petition is completely over, but election officials say they won’t issue a decision as to whether the Libertarian slate should be on the ballot until August 22. It is not known if the delay in the Libertarian decision is related to the timing of events in the Green Party case or not. Although the Libertarian Party showed in the binder check process that approximately 33,000 signatures are valid (25,000 are required), the challengers are now trying to invalidate all the work of certain Libertarian circulators.
Jeffrey Amason, who successfully collected the signatures of 5% of the voters in his State House district, but who still isn’t on the ballot, still hasn’t received a court date for his ballot access lawsuit. The case is Amason v Ford, Superior Court, Fulton County, 2014-cv-249517. Here is a copy of his amended complaint. The issue concerns notarization of most of his petition sheets. Amason incorporated his campaign, and his wife is an officer of the campaign corporation. Georgia law says a corporate officer may notarize documents for the corporation, yet so far election officials have kept him off the ballot because his wife notarized almost all of his petition sheets, but not the ones she circulated herself.
If Amason gets on the ballot, he will be the first minor party candidate on the Georgia ballot for legislature since 2004 (excluding special elections, for which no petition is required). UPDATE: see this story about the lawsuit in the Cherokee Ledger-News of August 13.
On August 12, a Michigan state court ruled when an individual signs the same petition twice, the state law striking both signatures violates the U.S. Constitution. In re City of Benton Harbor Mayoral Recall Election, Berrien County 2014-0117. The opinion finds that some individuals, in good faith, sign a petition a second time because they don’t remember if they already signed it or not.
The Secretary of State had filed a brief in support of the restriction. As a result of the decision, a recall petition for the Mayor of Benton Harbor now has enough valid signatures. Thanks to John Anthony LaPietra for the news.
On August 12, a U.S. District Court Magistrate ruled that Gregory Felsoci, the individual who challenged the primary petitions this year of three Libertarian Party statewide candidates, must reveal who is paying his legal fees. Although it is true that Felsoci does not know who is paying his legal fees, his attorneys must reveal this information to Felsoci, and then Felsoci must reveal this to the court.
The case is Libertarian Party of Ohio v Husted, southern district, 2:13cv-953. It is possible Felsoci will file an appeal to countermand the ruling, but if he does, he is obliged to do it quickly.