The East Valley Tribune, an Arizona newspaper, has this story about the Arizona Green Party’s lawsuit against the February petition deadline for newly-qualifying parties.
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The Democratic Party National Congressional Campaign Committee is backing Ed Jany for Florida’s U.S. House district 13 this year, even though he is a registered independent. See this story.
Jany would like to be a Democrat, but Florida law does not permit anyone to run in a primary if he or she has been a registered member of another party during the proceeding year. Jany had been a registered Republican for part of that period.
The Democratic Party statements criticize the Florida law, which was passed in 2011. But the Democratic Party does not reveal that it had a chance to overturn that law, as applied to Democratic candidates, and it refused to help. Nancy Argenziano had run for the legislature in 2012. Like Jany, she wanted to run as a Democrat, but the same law interfered with her as well. She filed a lawsuit against the restriction, but lost. Her attorney asked the Democratic Party of Florida to enter the lawsuit as a co-plaintiff, but the party refused. If the party had entered the lawsuit, Argenziano would probably have won. The U.S. Supreme Court said in Tashjian v Republican Party of Connecticut in 1986 that the First Amendment permits a political party to nominate a non-member, if it wishes. A federal court in New Mexico and a state court in Colorado have both struck down laws similar to the Florida law, in cases in which a political party itself brought the lawsuit. Thanks to Austin Cassidy for the link.
On April 25, the Eleventh Circuit denied Georgia’s request that the trial in Green Party of Georgia v State be put on hold. On April 4, the state had asked the Eleventh Circuit to suspend the case so the state would have time to ask for U.S. Supreme Court review, but that request has now been denied.
Georgia has now lost three times in the Eleventh Circuit. First, the Eleventh Circuit remanded the case for a trial; that happened on January 26. Then the state asked for rehearing, and that was denied on March 26.
The issue in the case is whether Georgia ballot access for presidential candidates is too difficult. No one has complied with the petition for President since 2000. Georgia and Indiana are the only two states with petition procedures so difficult that they haven’t been used in any of the last three presidential elections. Georgia requires approximately 50,000 valid signatures, and each petition sheet must be notarized. Thanks to Mike Raffauf for the latest news.
Joel Mathis has this essay, questioning the good sense of Pennsylvania’s ballot access practices, in Philadelphia Magazine. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.
This Mother Jones story details how a registered Republican who worked for the party during 2013 petitioned to get two Green Party members on the Green Party primary ballot, for New York’s U.S. House District 23. Neither petition succeeded, because of various technical flaws. If either petition had succeeded, there would have been a Green on the November ballot for that office.
New York law permits petitioning for a candidate before that candidate has signed any declaration of candidacy. However, when the petition is filed, the candidate must be notified and has four days to withdraw. In this case, neither of the two Green Party members were aware of the petition before the expiration of the withdrawal period.