Andrew Martin, the Democratic nominee for the Nevada Assembly, Ninth District (Las Vegas), won his election on November 6 and will be sworn in. However, the day before the election, a lower state court had ruled that he doesn’t reside in the district in which he was running. The judge didn’t put his opinion in writing, so his votes were counted and he will be seated. See this story. Thanks to Political Wire for the link.
According to this story, U.S. Senator Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) is about to resign from the Senate. The Governor will appoint a replacement, and then a special U.S. Senate election for this seat will be held in November 2014. The state’s other seat is up in 2014, so the voters will vote on both Senate seats at that time.
According to this Roll Call article, litigation over U.S. House district boundaries is still alive in ten states. These are all lawsuits in which the new districts (based on the 2010 census) were challenged before the November 2012 election, and the courts didn’t finish litigating in time, so temporary districts were used just for 2012. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.
The Georgia Libertarian Party is only ballot-qualified for statewide offices, not for U.S. House or state legislative races. However, a Georgia Libertarian candidate will be on the ballot for State Senate, 30th district, in the special election set for January 8, 2013. In Georgia special elections, anyone can get on the ballot by paying a filing fee; no petition is needed. In regularly-scheduled elections, though, candidates who are not Republican or Democratic nominees need a petition signed by 5% of the registered voters.
The Libertarian candidate, James Camp, will be the only person on the ballot other than Republican nominee Mike Dugan. There is a special election for this seat because the incumbent Senator who won the 2012 Republican primary, Bill Hamrick, resigned from the Senate on September 10, 2012, to accept a judicial appointment. The state then cancelled the general election that was to have been held for this seat on November 6, 2012. Instead the state held a Republican primary for the 30th district on November 6, and a run-off Republican primary on December 4.
The outcome of the Republican primary was a surprise. At the first Republican primary, on November 6, 2012, four Republicans had run, and a former member of the State House, Bill Hembree, had polled over 48%. If he had had at least 50% there would have been no run-off primary. But at the run-off primary on December 4, Hembree lost to Mike Dugan, who had only polled 27% in the November primary. Only 6% of the voters voted in the run-off primary on December 4. Hembree had given up a sure chance to be elected to the State House, by choosing instead to run in the State Senate Republican primary. He had already won the Republican primary for State House, 67th district, this year, but he resigned from that race so as to run for State Senate. His Republican replacement in the 67th district House race, Micah Gravley, easily won in November, defeating his Democratic opponent with 67.8% of the vote, so Hembree gave up a virtually certain victory in the House race and now won’t be going to either house.
The Maryland Green Party and the Maryland Libertarian Party have agreed to work for a bill to re-define “political party”, so that a group that has at least 10,000 registered members will meet the state’s definition of a qualified minor party. Maryland law already recognizes a group as a political party if it has registration of 1% of the state total, which is approximately 40,000 members.
Maryland law also recognizes a group if it submits a petition of 10,000 voters. The idea behind the bill is that if 10,000 voters, signing a petition, demonstrate enough support for a party to be recognized, there is no logic to not recognizing a group if it has 10,000 registered members. The coalition to support this bill invites other groups to join the coalition behind the bill idea. The coalition calls itself the 10K Coalition, and has a Facebook page, http://www.facebook.com/10KCoalition. Thanks to Brian Bittner for this news. Currently, the Libertarian Party has 11,256 registrants and the Green Party has 8,716 registrants. The two parties are automatically on the ballot in any event for 2014, because they both submitted 10,000 valid signatures earlier this year and that gives them each four years of qualified status.
If the bill passes, the alternate means for a party to be recognized would still exist: (1) poll 1% for the office at the top of the ticket at the last election; (2) a petition of 10,000 signatures. The bill would save money for election administrators, because they would not be required to check petition validity as often as they have in the past.
